Warning Signs
by SedaIlandereKaden
Summary: The Elves are preparing for war and some of their secretly trained operatives have to gather all necessary resources - whether it means to break the rules, save lives or kill. One of them has one more handicap - she's human and has to convince the Scoia'tael to cooperate... Will Coinneach help her to catch up with Iorveth and Isengrim?
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: I do not own any rights to the characters related to the Witcher Books or Games. I've done this for entertainment purposes only and not for profit. The rest of the story as well as the other characters are mine.**

**I didn't want to write a story from the typical Witcher Universe (well, partially at least), but rather a sort of „science fiction/fantasy" story intertwined somehow with the Witcher World and with some of the characters from either the Witcher Books or Games.**

**Apologies for any mistakes in grammar or wording – english is not my mother language and this is my first fanfic ever published in a foreign language. Although I'm trying to check the text every time before I publish it, I'll welcome any reviews/inputs on how to improve my writing skills. Nevertheless I hope you'll enjoy the story.**

_* The text in italics is to express the thoughts of a person at the given moment._

* * *

„Are you kidding me?!" she asked with disbelief in her voice and raised an eyebrow. Her sight was skipping between the four elves in the room looking for any hint of a joke in their faces. But they were quiet and their gaze serious.  
„Keaira, we can't send there anyone else..." Elanhar broke the silence finally, his icy blue eyes staring back at her almost apologizing for their request.  
„Oh, you mean in fact – 'not an elf'!" She leaned back on her chair and continued with obvious irony in her voice, her arms folded on her chest: „So let's send the human – nobody will care if she breakes the Codex, just as long as she'll do the dirty work for you..."

Ariven – the tall blond green-eyed one leaning against the wall accross the room - slightly gulped, but quickly looked out through the window on the side. He knew she was right – it was forbidden to intervene on a world at a lower stage of development - and that world was now somewhere in its Middle Ages, outside the Elven Federation. But they had no choice this time.

After another while she added with disgust: "You've made me work twice as hard as anyone else to pass the Academy, you did everything to frustrate and disgust me, to make me give up... Just because I am a female and moreover a human! And when despite of all the obstacles I've passed the final tests, accepting your rules, your way to live, swearing an oath on the Codex you hammered into my head for years, then the first task I get assigned by the Federation is this? Really?!"

The third male in the profusely decorated jacket standing with his back to the room in front of a large window, spoke now in a low calm tone: „We're standing at the precipice of war and the situation is very fragile. That's one of the reasons why we've put so many efforts into your training and the training of the others. We needed peacekeepers and the history has clearly shown, that females manage that with a great bravado, while males will sooner or later simply start to kill each other no matter their race. But we will also need every advantage we can get if Myriel and the others fail to keep the peace at the forthcoming negotiations, even if it means to break our own rules now."  
„Governor Lhoril, with all due respect, but I can't imagine, that this is really necessary. How can a few medieval savages help..." she started to argue well aware of her inappropriate tone and choice of words in order to express her objections, yet couldn't finish as she was bluntly interrupted by the fourth male:

„Watch your tongue little Dh'oine!" his fists clenched at his sides, his green eyes piercing her with open hatred.  
„Charming! Who are you anyway?" Keaira stared back at him defiantly, her mood on the freezing point already from the whole previous discussion. This one was a stranger. She has never seen him here before, nobody bothered to introduce him when she entered the room, and the whole time while Elanhar was explaining to her the reason and the details of the assignment, this stranger was glaring at her in a condescending manner making her only more angry.

„That's Eredin Bréacc Glas, he's..." Elanhar started to explain, but this time she interrupted him: "I see.. no need to explain further El, I know very well who he is – his ill fame is hardly a secret."  
"Please, we all need to work together here!" the governor tried to intervene before the situation gets out of hand, but the small woman and the blackhaired elf had already narrowed pupils, clenched teeth and the air quickly thickened with tension as they were trying to kill each other just with their gaze.  
"You little disgusting worm with no respect!"  
"Says the man who commited regicide on his own king!"  
"How dare you! In my world those like you are nothing more than pitiful slaves!"  
She jumped up, her face red, the chair tipping over and falling to the ground: "And in mine the elves exist only in fairytales!"  
They all visibly winced. Including her. She remembered something again...

The governor broke the following silence with an inconspicuous cough, looked at Eredin, making a graceful gesture towards the door: "May I propose a short break and invite you for a drink?"  
They walked out while Keaira was staring at the opposite wall on purpose, ignoring the angry face of the Aen Elle.

Ariven looked at Elanhar and slightly nodded. Elanhar stood up and quickly left the room as well. When the door behind him closed, Ari sighed:  
"Kea..." his tone was soft.  
"I know, I'm sorry, I was just... angry..." she was now staring down to the ground trying to avoid his look.  
He came close to her, leaned against the table in front of her and tilted towards her, so that he could look directly into her eyes. He could smell her pleasant scent of red poppy with a touch of cinnamon, but he restrained himself.  
"You know everything about that world, you know the history, the current situation. You know, we must send a human as an elf would have no chance to move that freely around as you can. You speak the local languages and the Elder Speech almost perfectly."  
She looked back at him with squeezed lips and he continued: "You will have no possibility to use any modern devices, medication or firearms and you'll be completely on your own. And that's the reason why we're sending you and nobody else..." he gulped and then almost whispered: "...because you're the best we have. The best I've ever trained..."  
Suddenly he straightened his back, looked to the side and a second later he walked out of the room without looking back. He had to do it before his eyes would betray him, before he would say more than he wanted to reveal... She was left standing there in the empty room, without any movement, her lips still squeezed, staring at the place where his eyes were just a moment ago...

* * *

The horse was gallopping through the night at an insane pace, the mud sprayed from under the hooves and she was literally pinned to his neck. The small redanian unit escorting Coinneach Dá Reo to Drakenborg was still several hours ahead of her and she needed to reach them before they'll get to the fortress.

In her mind she was cursing at El anyway – he took so long with the preparations and repeated all the names and instructions to her so often, that now it was almost too late.

Upon her arrival at Dillingen she found Angus and Riordain already dead – stabbed and strangled to death. At least Isengrim managed to escape the same fate according to a local fisherman who saw it all happen. She would have to find him later, for now he seemed to be alive and more or less safe.

Nobody heard anything about Iorveth – but there were rumours, that he has managed to escape the group escorting the others towards the Ravine of the Hydra. If they were true, then she had enough time to find him later as well. If not, then she couldn't help him anyway – the troups escorting the rest of the captured Scoia'tael were too large to deal with on her own.

Coinneach was for now the only one from her list about whom she knew where he is and whos life she had the greatest chance to still save.


	2. Chapter 2

She didn't even have to hold her horse back or gradually decrease it's pace, when she sensed them ahead of her. The horse was perfectly trained and slowed down instinctively until he finally stopped in such a distance, so that they can't hear her, but near enough for her to be able to walk the rest quickly on foot. He moved his ears back and forth and watched her as she jumped down. His fur had a dark chestnut colour, the mane and tail black, a distinct grey dot on his muzzle. She stroke him on his forehead: "Thank you Lanaer." It was a dark cold moonless night and almost windless. She was at an advantage. She pulled off her hooded cloak and threw it over the saddle. With her hand she quickly checked her belt with the retractable swords buckled around her hips and her fingertips went over the hilts, if each is at it's place. A malicious grin appeared on her face. Elanhar would be beside himself with rage if he would know, that she has taken them with her... But they only ordered her to use such weapons, which are common on that world and in that given time period, which was also supposed in fact to protect her identity. If these weapons have to be the local one's, or if she can use her own made from modern materials and using the newest technologies, that wasn't so clearly specified anymore by anybody. But she was aware of it, that those swords she carries with her, are against these rules. She cannot afford to leave a single one here, when she's going to leave. Besides, they are not hers...

* * *

"A sword is a sword." Ari winked at her with a hint of a smile, when he was passing the belt over to her. He was standing at her front door suddenly out of nowhere the evening before she left. It startled her. These swords have been custom-built for him and she knew, that he has received them once as a special gift of honour. Only a few have ever been awarded like this.  
"I can't do this... they're yours and they're priceless! What if..." she resisted, although they both knew very well, that she was yearning for such swords from the moment on, when he started to train her with them. And he made her swear back then to keep this training a secret, or they would both be in trouble if somebody would find out.  
"I've picked for you the shorter ones, the ones you've mastered the best... And you know yourself, which one is for what – you know their names and purpose. So take them now at last and don't make me beg you!" he reached out his hand and literally stuffed the belt with the swords into her palm. For a moment she holded onto his fingers, when she grasped the belt into her hand and looked into his eyes. She liked their marvelous emerald colour. And what sometimes appeared in those eyes, when he was looking at her for a while longer, even though he tried not to reveal anything and had a perfect self-control. Now he hesitated. She saw how his nostrils slightly expanded and for a fraction of a second she spotted that hungry longing in his eyes. Then he took a deep breath, straightened and added with a light smile:  
"You'll handle it, you've handled even worse." His face as if made of granite again. After that he turned to leave and while walking away he said casually: "And take care of yourself."

* * *

She was silently treading over the bumpy ground, positioning her feet carefully between the fallen twigs and with her eyes she was following the group of soldiers sitting around the fire, rowdily shouting during a card game.  
The tree, to which Coinneach has been chained to with his back, was right in front of her. Even despite the darkness she could see the swollen broken fingers, the wrists ragged and bleeding from the iron manacles. His forearms were twisted into an unnatural pose in such a way, that the chaining to the tree for multiple hours during the night would cause the biggest possible pain and preventing the prisoner from sleep. She was now barely six and a half feet away, when she noticed like he inconspicuously slightly turned his head to the right. She knew he heard her. And that he wouldn't rat her out – a redanian soldier, or random wayfarer would surely not sneak to him from behind his back a long way round through the forest so inhumanly quietly, when there are barely thirteen feet away from them seven fully armed soldiers sitting. She spotted, that two of them had crossbows leaning at their sides.

With her eyes she was practically hypnotizing the haggling guards and she was almost lying pinned down to the ground, when she crossed the rest of the distance and with her fingers gently touched his palm.  
"You still have two days until you reach Drakenborg, I need to think of something, so that we don't have later immediately half of the garrison on our trail. You have to hold out for a while longer."  
She was whispering it along the tree trunk as silently and as fast as she could in Elder Speech. Even though he could barely hear her, he noted a slight accent, which he could not quite place. But most of all he was surprised, that it's a woman. He would have rather expected, that someone from his former commando would try to get him out of this, but not some strange woman – this made no sense. Despite all the doubts he flimsily squeezed her fingers as a sign of understanding. She seemed to be his only hope for now.  
Just before she sneaked away again, she noticed his profile in the firelight. He had visibly a broken nose, his upper lip was covered with dried blood, there was a bruise under his eye, and he looked as if being on the brink of total exhaustion. Those pigs were clearly giving him a good thrashing for days on their way to the fortress. It made her angry.

She returned back to Lanaer, slinging the hooded cloak again over her shoulders and she swinged back to the saddle. Keaira remembered a small settlement which she has passed through some two hours ago. That could be the solution. A disgusting one, but in a situation, where she was left to herself alone, she was following the motto, that the end justifies the means. She turned the horse around and spurred him to a gallop.

* * *

The sun was rising, when the horse trotted to the first completely burned down house and she jumped to the ground. This time she stowed the cloak into one of the saddle's pockets. She untied a scarf from her upper arm which she used to cover her nose and mouth, binding it together at the back of her head above a loosely tied ponytail. Somebody has thoroughly massacred this place a few days back...

She was slowly stepping over the burned or chopped corpses and carefully pushing aside the hair from the males' temples to see the ears, alternatively raising their upper lips to check the teeth when somebody has cut away their ears before. Keaira tried to avoid the pools of blood, the stench in the surrounding air was unbelievable and she didn't feel an urge to vomit because of the sole reason, that they have drilled her during the training for whole weeks exactly for this. In the beginning she always started to throw up already within the first few minutes and couldn't stop. Later she endured at least for so long until hasn't finished the given task, but immediately after that she was throwing up without stopping again. Only almost at the end she realized, that she must block this right in her head. Not even admitting the existence of that stench. _The nose smells nothing... there's no reason for the brain to react... the stomach is fine... _

She was just passing by a young woman lying on the ground in a huge stinking decomposing pool of blood mixed with feces, with empty wide opened eyes, her throat cut from ear to ear, the clothes ripped from top to bottom, breasts burned with a heated knife or the tip of a sword, legs spread wide, a knife stuck in her lacerated cunt. Somebody managed to piss down at her at that... About three feet away from her an infant with a cleaved head was lying.

Keaira heard a thunk as if something would've hit the crushed ground. She immediately turned her head that way, but there were only the last two cottages standing in front of her. She ducked and sneaked like a cat aroung the first one, cautiously looking around the corner. In the small area between the cottages three soiled men armed with swords were crouching down. They were searching the pockets of the dead, pulling off the boots and pieces of clothing they could use and they were taking everything they've found what seemed to be worth it. The rest was thrown aside. _Damn, that's the last thing I need now. I really don't have the time for such delays at the moment. _She noticed, that not so far away a tall well-built male was lying with his face down to the ground and in her mind she prayed, that he's an elf. But she couldn't reach him without being seen.

She slightly rotated her belt with the swords on her hips, so that Essmaiweth was at her right hand. Some of these swords had their own names as unique technologies and materials have been used to create them. The name of this one meant loosely translated 'the one, that grants a quick death' and his special strong single-edged blade allowed her to cut through bones, tendons and muscles to a certain extent without the need of using too much power or efforts. She remembered how Ariven has taught her to handle first of all this sword.

* * *

"You're small, you have a lower weight. You don't have such power to be able to cut off with just one blow an arm, a leg, or even a head with a common sword, when you need to get rid of your opponent fast and incapacitate him. That's what Essmaiweth is for. For me it saves energy if I have multiple enemies in front of me, which I need to hold at bay at the same time. It gives someone weaker like you the possibility of the same powerful blow as a grown man when standing against a single opponent, which allows you to end the fight quicker without unnecessary exhaustion. But remember, that not even the best of all swords will help you, if your enemy is faster, better and has more stamina than you... and he doesn't even have to be stronger."

* * *

She came forward from around the corner, pulled the scarf from her nose and mouth down to her neck, shifted her weight slightly to her left leg and positioned her hands at her hips, so that her palms touched the belt with swords.  
"Sorry to interrupt, gentlemen..."  
All three of them immediately jumped up and unsheathed their swords. They didn't hear her approach and she caught them off guard.  
Keaira continued: "Just carry on, I don't see you and you don't see me. Deal?"  
The first one, obviously the leader of this comic trio, was eyeballing her from head to toe, then he gave her an amused smirk and waved with the tip of his sword in her direction:  
"You think you're funny, little girl, huh? I don't see a bow or a sword, the only thing I see is the knife strapped to your thigh. And you don't have a chance with that against three men armed with swords. Instead I see a nice pair of tits in your tight leather jacket and I'll gladly help you get rid of the blade with my own teeth, when I'll be playing a bit between your legs..." he showed his ugly yellow holey teeth and made a move towards her.  
_Gods, how much I love the beautiful clean white elven smiles with those small equal teeth – _flickered through her head suddenly and she almost shivered with disgust at the mere sight of his slobbery ulcerous mouth. _I really don't have the time for this – _crossed her mind again.

"Maybe you should ask the lady first, if she agrees?!" she snarled, twitched her hand and with one fast fluent move she pulled the hilt out of the belt and instantly pushed the safety lock. The sword unfolded with a quiet clicking sound and in the moment when it reached full length, the guard and the pommel have activated. It took only the split of a second. The silvery steel blade with its extremely sharp edge was shining in the light of the rising sun and the man with the rotting teeth had noticed, that what he thought to be a second fuller on the wide blade first, was in fact an inscription in elven lettering carved along almost the whole length of the slightly curved blade. The beautiful elven pattern on the guard had a greenish colour interwoven with silver.  
None of the men has ever seen anything like this before.

"Shit! Forget the bloody loot Fattie! That's some kind of a sorceress or something! I'm not in the slightest mood for being killed by a mad slut because of you!" yelled the last man at the back, turned backwards and started to run along the cottages to a forest path, where their horses have been tied to a tree.  
The second hesitated for a while, but then quickly turned and without saying a word also ran towards the forest.  
A remarkably vicious smile has flashed over Keaira's face as she observed the man with his ugly mouth in front of her: "So, bloede Dh'oine, shall I repeat once more my previous proposal, or are you insinsting on yours?!"  
One could see on his face how greed and lust inside are struggling with fear. Suddenly he squinted his eyes and took a step forward swinging his sword. She expected it and this skanky swine was already at first glance not the greatest fencing master. She only leaned a bit to the right to avoid the tip of his sword, which flew by her cheek, slightly shifting her weight from one leg to another. At the same time her sword separated with a blow from the bottom up in a short powerful curve his wrist, which was holding his sword, from the rest of his arm. His wrist still holding the sword fell to the ground and blood gushed from the man's open forearm. His eyes widened in shock, his bottom lip trembled and for a second he was struck dumb watching his own blood sputtering from the wound. A moment later a mad howl sounded through the air, he grabbed the wound stump and tried to stop the bleeding with his other hand.

"You fucking bitch! You elven piece of shit!" the man was kneeling now, covering the stump on his right hand, crazy from the pain and shouted curses at her at a fast pace. She could hear two horses galloping away in the distance.  
Keaira bended down towards the man and pushed back her hair behind her ear. "Do you see any pointed ears you stinking dog?" her voice was as cold as her gaze. She slowly straightened up and before he could come around, she gripped the hilt of her sword with both hands, hauled off in a broad arc and separated his head from the torso with one fast blow from the right side.  
The torso stayed for a while in kneeling position as if it would not know to which side to fall, and then after a moment it slowly descended towards her feet. The blood splashing from the neck in the same rhythm as from his forearm smudged her high elven jackboots, which were strapped with buckles up to her knees. His head rolled some three feet away and stared at her with eyes wide open. She remembered how Ari once told her, that after being cut off the head and the brain still perceive the surroundings for another fifteen or twenty seconds. She looked into the thug's eyes and spoke ice-cold as before: "Be glad Fattie, you had it quick..."

With a fast twitch of her arm she shook off the blood from the blade and thoroughly wiped it clean with a piece of the dead torso's shirt. Then she pushed and turned the safety lock on the hilt. The guard, pommel and the blade immediately retracted back to the hilt. With another skilled move she inserted the hilt into the round narrow pocket at the outside of the belt. Only the topmost last inch was emerging from the pocket. There were eleven pockets around the belt, but she only carried eight of the shorter swords, that Ari gave her. The others were not necessary. She was used to these eight, each of them had it's place on the belt and it's purpose. The pockets had inside the upper part a special ring, which held the hilt in place and prevented it to fall out during jumps or somersaults. At the same time when squeezed from the side, it allowed the wearer a fast drawing of the sword. The one who wanted to learn how to handle these swords, had to learn how to use the belt as well, as they inextricably belonged together.

Keaira had the feeling, that she's starting to feel this pervasive stench on her tongue. She spitted and pulled the scarf over her nose and mouth back again. At last she could move towards the dead male's body, which she has noticed earlier nearby. He was lying on his stomach. She bended and pushed his hair back. A pointed ear appeared. _Finally! _she was relieved, that she can stop to force her way through all the other dead corpses an that she's found what she needed.  
Keaira turned the dead elf's body to lie on it's back. _What a shame... _she thought. He had a beautiful symmetric face and pleasant delicately chiselled features. She couldn't tell his age – still had problems with it although Elanhar has desperately tried to teach her how to do it. But she noticed, that he has about the same height and figure as the one she was looking for and when she turned his head, she could see that the profile matched more or less as well. At least according to what she managed to observe during the short moment in the night. Nobody has stolen his clothes or even boots yet. _Probably it was all too big for those human harpies._

Something came to her mind and she looked to the small forest path, which the two thugs used earlier to escape. A third horse – a palomino - was still standing there...  
She came closer and assessed him. To her surprise he looked healthy, well-fed and calm. He wasn't for sure a racing champion, but on the other side also not a slow draft horse. The fur was light brown, the mane and tail almost white, the saddle comfortable and of best quality. Her guess was, that it's stolen just like the horse. She untied the horse from the tree, stroked him on his forehead and tapped on the side. The horse nodded and snorted slightly, she took the reins and lead the horse next to the dead elf. _Well, this is going to be much harder... _She scratched her head and sighed. Then she hailed Lanaer with a whistle.

Her horse immediately trotted carefully to them, avoiding to step onto the corpses. She reached out to the backside of the saddle and pulled out a short rope. Then bended over the dead elf, put the rope under his back and tied a knot on his chest. She threw the rest of the rope over the palomino's saddle and pointed with her hand to a spot on the other side for Lanaer to go there. After that she tied the end of the rope to Lanaer's saddle and ordered: "Pull!" The horse moved, the rope fully expanded and Lanaer cautiously walked forward trying to avoid the further corpses on his way. Keaira was holding the palomino's reins, so that it doesn't twitch too much. The dead elf's body slowly got off the ground towards the saddle. Shortly the elf's head reached the top of the saddle and tumbled down on the other side.

"Slowly!" she ordered. Surprisingly the palomino was standing still during the whole procedure. When the elf's upper body finally completely fell over the horse's saddle and his legs remained hanging down on the other side, she told Lanaer to stop. She went over to him and untied the rope from his saddle, then turned back to the palomino and used the rest of the rope to firmly strap the dead body on the horse's back.  
Afterwards she swinged back to Lanaer's saddle, pulled off the scarf and tied it back to her upper arm. Then she grabbed the palomino's reins into her hand. She looked briefly back, if her 'cargo' is really thoroughly fixed in place. Her eyes stopped at the elf's ass protruding from the saddle. "Damned shame..." she mumbled and forced her horse to a trot leading the palomino behind them. She knew, that there's no need to rush like the night before, but she needed to reach the redanian escort as quickly as possible. It would be a great advantage, if they would have later with Coinneach enough time to cover a large distance still during daylight.


	3. Chapter 3

It was late morning, when she spotted in the distance the redanian escort with Coinneach. She stopped the horses for a while and observed the group moving on the dusty road. There was one rider in front of the group, she recognized behind him Coinneach, next to him and behind him were the other six soldiers slowly walking. She cursed in her mind – she hasn't expected to see a rider. She has overlooked the horse in the night, which must have been out of her sight when she sneaked up to them. She'll need to get rid of the rider first. And fast.  
She bended and tied the palomino's reins to Lanaer's saddle. After that she pulled out from a side pocket a hair ribbon and tied her hair into a knot on the back of her head, so that it doesn't obscure her sight angle later. She was still thinking about those two smaller crossbows, which she saw in the night. She will need to get very close to them to see which two soldiers from those seven have them. That will be her next priority.  
Under normal circumstances she would get rid of the crossbowmen first, but if there's a rider with them, she'll have to rely upon her speed and good cover and focus on him. She can deal with the rest of them without bigger trouble. She was rather worried, if one of those soldiers won't use Coinneach as a hostage before she manages to kill them. Or worse – if they don't kill him when they realize, that she came for him.  
She checked and amended with her hand quickly the belt with swords. From one of the saddle's pockets she pulled out her cloak, covered herself with it and dragged the hood deeply in front of her face. With the cloak's bottom she covered the elven embroidery on the blanket emerging from underneath the saddle. She took a few deep breaths and spurred the horses into a trot.

The squad was slowly moving on the dusty road on foot, the silhouette of Fort Drakenborg loomed large on the horizon in front of them. The rearmost soldier noticed the approaching rider behind them and warned the others. They stopped and watched the oncoming person and two horses. One of the soldiers grabbed the collar on Coinneach's officer uniform of the Vrihedd brigade and pushed him to the roadside. He leaned the drawned crossbow against Coinneach's side. The rider was coming closer and they spotted a dead body on the back of the second horse.  
„False alarm." Said one of the soldiers at the front. „That's just some bounty hunter who's going to Drakenborg for a reward..."  
They visibly eased up, but the mounted armsman in front of the escort didn't stop to keep an eye on the approaching rider. Something was not right. He turned his horse towards the rider. He was holding a drawned crossbow in one of his hands leaned against the forearm of his other arm and slowly directed it at the rider. After a while he realized, that the rider is too small for a man.  
„How many female bounty hunters do you know?!" he sizzled angrily.  
The soldiers were immediately vigilant again. Coinneach carefully turned his head and examined the oncoming rider. He could see with his trained eye in an instant, that it was in fact a woman. He noticed the hood dragged down much too deep and the cloak thoroughly covering the whole saddle. He braced himself and inconspicuously looked down at the crossbow leaning against his side. He assessed the angle under which he could evade a possible shot. Then he looked back at the cloaked woman..

„Stop now! Not one step further!" shouted the armsman, when she was just a few feet away from them. He raised his forearm with the crossbow and pointed it towards the cloaked rider to show her, that he's serious about it.  
_Killing two birds with one stone.. _flashed through Keaira's mind, when she saw the crossbow in his hands.  
The horses stopped and a hand in a long greygreen glove slowly emerged from underneath the cloak. With a gentle gesture she implied not to shoot. Coinneach immediately spotted the small brown elven embroidery on the glove's hem. Fortunately none of the soldiers, nor the armsman, had such fast perception for details as him.  
„I'm on my way to Vascoigne for a reward." said the woman to the soldiers. Her voice was pleasant and she had a slight accent in her pronunciation. Coinneach immediately recognized it – it was the same as the one in the night before. While she was talking, she slowly pulled away the hood from her face and her hand remained on the hood's edge. For a short moment they all looked at her amazed. Including him.  
The unknown woman had a very nice symmetric face, sensual lips, delicate nose and hazelnut eyes with long eyelashes. The end of her left eyebrow was intersected by an old barely visible scar which ended at the corner of her eye. Her curly dark-brown hair tied to a knot at the back of her head revealed her rounded human ears.  
„Don't lie to me, sweetie!" the armsman continued to sizzle angrily. The helmet on his face extended down to the tip of his nose, above the nose were only two slots through which his evil eyes could be seen.  
„Why do you think, that I'm lying? You seem to be a quick thinker, so tell me then what other reason would I have to carry along a dead elf to Drakenborg?" replied with a stoically calm voice the unknown woman to the armsman. He paused for a while.  
„And who is the dead elf then, if you think, that you'll get a reward for him in Drakenborg?!" asked one of the foot soldiers with a smirk on his face and broke the silence.  
The woman slowly turned her head towards them. _Too slow..._ realized Coinneach and instinctively tensed his muscles before the expected attack. Keaira's eyes were during this slow turn quickly jumping from one soldier to another looking for the second crossbowman. _Damn!_ She cursed in her mind, when she saw the crossbow leaned against Coinneach's side. For a brief moment she noticed, that his hands are tied in front of him, looked into his face and their eyes have met. He slightly nodded with a nearly invisible motion of his head. _I'll manage..._  
Her head started to slowly turn back to the armed rider. Now she was assessing the strength of each soldier. Her sight remained pinned to the crossbow in the armsman's hands.  
„Coinneach Dá Reo." She replied with the same stoically calm voice as before and her hand slid inconspicuously to the buckle holding the cloak.  
For a second they were all silent and then the soldiers started to laugh aloud. The armsman's hand on the crossbow relaxed a bit...

What followed immediately after that would remain in detail in Coinneach's memory until the end of his life.

* * *

In the fraction of a second he saw, how the cloak is falling from the woman's shoulders revealing her saddle and clothes with elven ornaments. And her jacket reinforced with a dense net of steel eyelets. At the same time one of her hands scurried away from her thigh forwards and a knife glistened in the air.  
The armed rider with the crossbow in his hands didn't have the time to take a shot anymore. Like in slow-motion he started to tilt back on his horse while the knife's hilt was protruding from one of the narrow slots in his helmet.  
Suddenly out of nowhere a sword appeared in the woman's other hand. At lightning speed the sword's blade has cut through the carotid artery of the nearest soldier. The stream of blood from his throat splashed onto the woman's high elven boot with decorated buckles and his body fell immediately to the ground.  
Coinneach reacted to it all just a little bit earlier than the soldier leaning the crossbow to his side. With a fast turn backwards he got out of the way of the flying arrow, which was fired just a second later.  
The tip of the arrow scraped the back of his jacket.  
The armsman's body has now fallen to the ground next to his horse with his right foot trapped in the stirrup.  
The woman stood up with a fierce jump onto her horse's saddle.  
The soldier standing closest to the second crossbowman has started to move with a warning shout and a sword in his hand towards Coinneach.  
The other three soldiers have started to move simultaneously towards the woman's horse.  
The tip of the fired arrow has now struck the armsman's horse right behind the saddle.  
The woman shouted a short command to her horse and bounced up from a crouch at the same time from the saddle.  
Coinneach has raised his hands above his head and stretched the chain between the manacles while turning.  
One of the three soldiers hauled off to a blow from the bottom up with his sword against the woman's horse with a loud shout.  
The armsman's horse reared up on his hind limbs in pain from the arrow stuck in his side and wildly neighed.  
The woman made a somersault during her flight high above the three soldiers.  
The chain between Coinneach's manacles flew by with a rattling sound in front of the crossbowman's face and cut into his throat.  
The woman's horse has turned away from the attacking soldier with a flinch to the side and started running in a heavy gallop with the palomino right behind him. Her cloak thrown over the horse's back slipped at the same time to the dusty road.  
Two of the soldiers attacking the woman wielded their swords to strike a blow and at the same moment they turned their heads to watch the woman's somersault high above them.  
The soldier attacking Coinneach raised with both hands and a wild shout his sword above his right shoulder.  
The woman thudded to the ground into a crouch with a loud gasp and with the sword in her hand behind the backs of the three attacking soldiers.  
The blade of the soldier's sword attacking the woman's horse has closely missed the running palomino's tail.  
The armsman's horse started galloping following the palomino dragging the dead man with the knife in his eye along with him.  
Coinneach crossed his arms behind the crossbowman's neck and pulled him to the side between himself and the attacking soldier with a furious scream. The crossbowman's hands released the crossbow and flew up to the chain choking his throat.  
The woman straightened up in an attacking position and at the same time a second sword appeared in her hand.  
The two soldiers now standing with their backs to her started to turn their bodies towards her.  
The tip of the sword of the third soldier attacking the woman's horse before has now glistened in a high arc above his head while his loud shout subsided.  
All three galloping horses disappeared together between the trees in the forest with the cargo of two dead corpses.  
The soldier attacking Coinneach has disemboweled with the blade of his sword the crossbowman's stomach from underneath the last left rib down to his right hip.  
The woman attacked simultaneously with a wide swing of both her swords the two soldiers turning in front of her in a crouching position with the weight on her front leg pushed forward.  
The third attacking soldier has just finished the previous move with the sword next to his right calf.  
A part of the bowels emerged from the crossbowman's open stomach and started to fall to the ground in a pendulous arc.  
With a loud shout the woman cut off with one blow of her right sword the left forearm under the elbow of the first attacking soldier and at the same time slashed the right knee's ligament of the second attacking soldier with her left sword.  
The third soldier started to lift his sword above his right shoulder and moved towards the woman.  
The sword in the hands of the soldier attacking Coinneach ended the move next to the soldier's left calf and the crossbowman's blood splashing from the flying blade has fallen to the ground in a broad arc.  
The blood splashing from the woman's swords splattered from both sides to the face of the third attacking soldier approaching her.  
Both injured soldiers in front of the woman have simultaneously fallen to the ground with a hellish yell.  
The third soldier has hauled off to strike the next blow from high above his right shoulder and shifted his weight from one leg to another ignoring the blood splattering onto his face.  
The crossbowman's squeezed throat let out one last wheezing howl and his falling body started to pull down Coinneach's hands with the chain.  
The blades of both swords in the woman's hands were swinging in fast circular moves around her head and body and then punched from each side into the throat of the third soldier in front of her. The blood splashing from his throat has splattered onto her face and the top of her elven greygreen leather jacket.  
The soldier with the severed left forearm released his sword and tried with a painful scream to stop the blood sputtering from his elbow. The second injured soldier also released his sword and was holding with a high-pitched yell on the dusty road his bleeding right knee.  
Coinneach didn't manage to release in time the chain between his manacles holding the crossbowman's neck and bending forward with his hands weighted with the dead corpse he raised his sight looking for the attacker in front of him.  
The woman left both swords stuck in the throat of the third soldier and turned her body towards the soldier attacking Coinneach while suddenly another sword appeared in her hand.  
The third soldier behind her with two swords stuck in his throat fell at the same time quietly with his back onto the dusty road raising the dust in a cloud around him.  
Coinneach saw how the sword in the hands of the soldier standing in front of him started to lift up to the soldier's left shoulder preparing for the next blow.  
The right wrist of the woman's hand tossed her sword high up into the air above her and at the same time her upper body bended backwards and turned in a spin.  
Coinneach instinctively reacted to the incoming sword blow with an evasive maneuver to the side while he was watching with his eyes the furious facial expression and the moving sword blade of the attacking soldier.  
The woman jumped from one leg to another in her rapid flip while the falling sword turned with the tip of its blade towards the soldier attacking Coinneach.  
On the ground behind the woman two injured soldiers were winding in pain and screaming for help.  
Coinneach tensed the muscles of his arms with all his power during the evasive maneuver and pulled with a fierce scream the crossbowman's dead corpse still hanging on the chain of his manacles along with him.  
The woman's rapidly blown up leg pushed off the ground during her flip has hit in a broad arc in the air the pommel of her falling sword with perfect precision and timing, propelling it with tremendous speed horizontally towards the attacking soldier.  
The soldier with the severed left forearm tried to get as fast as possible on his knees to the nearest bushes on the roadside.  
In that moment, when the attacking soldier started to drop down his sword towards the evading Coinneach, the blade of the horizontally flying sword flashed next to his temple.  
The soldier lying on the ground with the injured knee started to shout curses at the woman.  
Coinneach saw how the silvery steel blade pierced the soldier's temple and for a fraction of a second he noticed the last part of the tiny elven inscription carved into the blade - ‚...iweth'.  
The woman landed on both her feet back on the ground after kicking the sword, straightened up and almost immediately the next sword appeared in her hand.  
The dead falling soldier with the woman's sword in his head has hit during the movement Coinneach's shoulder with the tip of his sword and ripped his officer jacket causing a two and a half inches long wound.  
While still bended forward Coinneach's eyes automatically moved to the direction from which the elven sword came flying.  
The woman was standing bestriding the back of the soldier with the severed forearm lying with his stomach on the ground, held his head up in the air by pulling his hair and was cutting his throat with her fourth sword. One last wheezing bubbling long cry of the soldier ringed in Coinneach's ears.  
The injured soldier with the bleeding knee tried to crawl away from the woman with a begging scream.  
Behind him two crossed elven swords were soaring up from the dusty road stuck in the throat of a dead soldier.  
Coinneach's eyes turned back to the ground in front of him and noticed the fallen sword of the soldier who attacked him before.  
He propped up with his leg the crossbowman's corpse and finally loosened the chain from the dead crossbowman's throat.  
In that moment, when the second wheezing bubbling cry sounded through the air, Coinneach grabbed the sword on the ground with the broken fingers of his hands and with a painful facial expression turned towards the woman standing on the dusty road.

* * *

Everything was dead silent now. The dispersed dust slowly started to fall back to the ground. Keaira and Coinneach were standing about thirty feet apart, silently looking each other over from head to toe. They both looked horrible.

She had her face and the top of her jacket covered with flowing blood droplets. The greygreen-colored hardened leather jacket embroidered on her back and shoulders with a brown elven ornament reached down to the middle of her hips and tightly engulfed her body. The jacket had a wide collar fastened up on her throat with a decorated buckle. Her upper arms were covered with a dense net of steel eyelets reaching down underneath her elbows. The dense net was also around the whole collar and on the front side of her jacket. A green scarf was tied to one of her upper arms. The dark brown tumbled leather pants were embroidered with a greygreen elven ornament along the seams. A leather sheath for a knife was tied to the outside of one of her thighs. The dark brown tight-fitting knee-long boots were fastened up on her calves with decorated buckles and the upper part of the shaft had a broad fringe in a greygreen color embroidered with a brown elven ornament. One of the boots was almost completely covered with fresh blood. She had a broad leather belt around her hips with round narrow pockets covering almost the whole belt and a small pouch was at the front side. The long tumbled leather gloves had the same color and ornaments as her jacket. The cloak lying nearby on the ground had the same dark brown color as her pants and boots, but without any ornaments. He could see at first sight, that she has a nicely shaped buff body with feminine breasts and hips. She was quite small, he guessed that her height was just a bit more than five feet.  
She was standing there splay-footed with her weight on the right leg, holding a curved elven sword in her right hand. Blood was dripping down from the sword's blade and she was partially covered with the road's dust. She was panting from the previous physical strain.

He had a swollen broken nose and the dry blood was adhered to his upper lip. A bruise was under his right eye. Aside from that he had a really beautiful symmetric elven face framed by auburn mid-length hair, his cat eyes had a remarkable olive-green color. An old very deep scar intersected the middle of his left pointed ear and ended on his cheek bone. He was over six feet tall, his broad shoulders, a muscular chest and strong arms were clearly visible in the white shirt under the unbuttoned black officer jacket. He had a ripped emblem with three silver lightning bolts on one of his sleeves. On the shoulder above it she could see through the torn jacket a fresh bleeding wound. He was wearing light brown leather pants on his firm long legs and black knee-long elven jackboots fastened up with buckles on his calves. Her sight remained for a short moment on his crotch and her mouth twitched slightly. _That's quite a sizable equipment even for an elf..._  
He was holding a raised sword in his hands. His wrists were ragged and bleeding underneath the iron manacles, the chain linking both manacles was hanging down to the middle of his forearms. He held the sword in swollen broken fingers, on his face a painful look and he was completely exhausted.

„What do you want from me, filthy Dh'oine?!" he sizzled at her after a while with gritted teeth. Aside from the hostile tone he had a deep sensual manly voice.  
„To save your life." She replied calmly.  
„Why would you do that, human?" he asked again, but now with a more peaceful tone.  
„That would take too long to explain it, we have no time now. I can tell you everything on the way." She said and bended down to the dead body lying underneath her feet.  
With a slight surprise he watched her as she casually ripped off a piece of the dead corpses' cloth, then shook off the blood from the sword's blade with a fast twitch of her arm and wiped it thoroughly clean with that rag. After that he heard a quiet clicking sound and the sword suddenly disappeared from her hand. Only the hilt remained in her palm, which she then inserted with a fluent move into one of the narrow pockets on her belt. Now he understood from where so many swords appeared in her hands before.  
„And why do you think, that I'll go anywhere with you, human sorceress?!" he laughed sarcastically.  
She sighed sullenly: „Because you have currently no other choice, Coinneach Dá Reo – leader of a Scoia'tael commando, officer of the Vrihedd brigade, the elven division of the nilfgaardian fourth Cavalry Army led by Isengrim Faoiltiarna also known as the ‚Iron Wolf', commanded by Major General Markus Braibant during the battle at Brenna. You were convicted for the participation in the siege of the town Dillingen to death by hanging at Fort Drakenborg, which is notoriously famous for special torturing methods for nonhumans. As far as I know, your charges included terrorism, killing civilians, torturing prisoners and massacring the wounded in hospitals..." she watched from the corner of her eye how he literally froze as she said this, then she added shortly: „And I'm no sorceress. If you meant my swords, there's no magic behind it. They are simply produced in a way, which is not known here, that's all."  
He raised curiously one eyebrow: „How do you know so well who I am?"  
„I'll explain that on our way as well." She replied while she walked to the dead soldier lying on the road with two swords stuck in his throat.  
She grabbed one and released it from the soldier's throat with a strong twitch. Then she cleaned it in the same way as the one before. She inserted the hilt into one of her belt's pockets and repeated the whole procedure with the second sword.  
He hesitated a bit and then he lowered his hands holding the sword, but kept it in front of his body.  
„Just release the sword now Coinneach. I'm not your enemy. Otherwise you wouldn't be standing there..." she told him with a cold voice, when she threw away the bloodstained piece of cloth which she has previously used to clean her swords into the bushes on the roadside. She picked up her cloak from the road and wiped it clean. She didn't even look at him.

He looked at the whole massacre around them. He knew she's right. She was damn quick and didn't hesitate to attack alone seven redanian soldiers. She could easily deal with him as well. Under normal circumstances they would be equal opponents, but he was now at the end of his tether. He finally released the sword from his sore fingers and dropped it to the ground.  
„Do you really expect from me, that I will now voluntarily walk away from here on foot with some strange Dh'oine into the unknown?" the snooty sarcastic tone of his voice remained.  
The woman folded her cloak in the meantime and untied with one hand the green scarf from her upper arm. She wiped her bloodstained face thoroughly clean, then wiped away the blood from the jacket's shoulders and from her boots. She crumpled up the scarf and stowed it in the small pouch on her belt. Then she slowly walked towards him with the folded cloak in her hand while she was talking:  
„Would you like to rather wait here, until somebody comes to pick you up from Drakenborg? Are you craving so much for their torture and death by hanging? The loud noise we made a while ago could be heard quite far. Sooner or later somebody will come here and then they'll chase you. If you go alone, they'll catch you quickly. You're so weak, that you'll walk just a few miles before you break down."  
In the meantime she came close to him and stopped just three feet away. She was looking up to his face.  
_She has really a very pretty face for a human... _crossed his mind.  
She continued after a short pause: „Look at you – you have a broken nose, broken fingers on your hands, you've been beaten up, the wound on your shoulder must be sutured and your wrists must burn awkwardly underneath those manacles..." they both looked down to his hands.  
„Oh, and I almost forgot – you'll hardly catch something to eat in the forest with those manacles..." now she had a sarcastic tone in her voice. „Maybe you should try to choke a rabbit with that chain. You've managed that quite well with the crossbowman..." she raised her head again and looked into his eyes. She had a mocking smile.  
The hint of a smile appeared on his face as he imagined that.  
„I have a proposal for you, Coinneach. I will help you to get away from here, I'll find a healer for you, tell you who I am, why I'm here and what I would need from you. After that you can decide for yourself, what you will do with the information. If you continue to accompany me, or if we go separate ways. It's up to you and I have no right to force you to anything. But I haven't risked my life in vain – you owe me something and all I want for it is, that you hear me out."  
While she was talking he was observing the scar on her eyebrow and her moving lips, on which after another short pause a pleasant smile appeared.  
„And one more thing – we will not walk on foot, don't worry." She added and without breaking her gaze she shortly whistled.  
The sound of trampling horse hooves echoed in the forest on the opposite side of the road and soon after her horse appeared between the trees. Following him was the palomino with the dead elf strapped to the saddle. They both looked that way. To their great surprise the wounded horse with the arrow stuck in his side appeared behind the palomino. He was still dragging along the dead corpse of the armsman with his right foot trapped in the stirrup.  
„Oh, my knife has returned. I'm quite relieved - won't have to get a new one..." she made a scathing remark with such cold sarcasm in her voice when looking at the arriving horses, that it has send a chill down his spine. He understood, that he should not mess her around.

The horses walked onto the road and the woman's horse came close to her. The small woman turned, walked up to the saddle and stowed her cloak into one of the side pockets. After that she took off one of her gloves and stroke the horse very gently on his forehead. The horse lowered his head and she leaned her head against his.  
„Thank you Lanaer." She whispered with closed eyes and stroke him again.  
Coinneach was watching the scene stunned and on his otherwise motionless elven face an open surprise could be seen. That astonishing sudden change in the woman's tone and the tenderness in her hand as she stroke the horse were in huge contrast to the previous fight and to the way how she talked to him.  
„You have many faces, Dh'oine." He said when he regained his self-control again and the expressionless mask returned to his face.  
„Just like you elves." She replied with a short smile, that appeared on her lips for a moment.  
She slowly went through the horse's neck, chest and forelegs with her bare hand, then turned her palm and looked at it. Thereupon she continued over his whole side to his tail and checked her hand again.  
„Skillful, Lanaer, not a single scratch. Very good." She smiled again and tapped the horse on the side. The horse snorted satisfied.  
„Ehm..." coughed Coinneach.  
She looked at him with a question in her eyes. Without saying a word he raised his hands and rattled with the chain on his manacles. She nodded, turned away and went to the dead armsman. She bended over him and pulled her knife from his eye with a strong jerk. Coinneach realized, that she's quite surely not doing this for the first time. Then she thoroughly cleaned her knife on the armsman's pants while she was still bended and inserted it into the sheath on her thigh. She started to search the pockets of the armsman and after a while she straightened up with a victorious smile. She turned towards Coinneach and waived in the air with a key in her hand.

He smiled and nodded. She returned back to him, unlocked the manacles and carefully pulled them off his hands. She laid the manacles to the ground with the key in one of the locks. It was a great relief. He rubbed his ragged wrists and nodded again to thank her.  
„Good, and now the second part of our show..." she said, picked up the sword, which was lying at his feet and went over to the dead soldier with her last sword in his head. She laid the army sword down next to the dead corpse, bended and grabbed the hilt of her sword, which was stuck in the head. Then she heavily pulled it. Coinneach was standing behind her and watched her, his sight stayed for a while on her ass. The sword moved just a little bit and remained stuck in the soldier's temple. She cursed aloud.  
„The correct pronunciation is ‚badraigh'." he said from behind her back. Bended over as she was, she just turned her head to him and looked into his face. He had a big grin on his face from ear to ear. She turned her head back to her sword and spoke with a calm voice: „Thanks for correcting me. You can do this next time as well, I'd like to improve my pronunciation." But she had also a big grin on her face which he couldn't see.  
She twisted the sword a bit, then propped herself with one leg against the dead corpse and pulled the hilt with all her power. The sword blew out so fast, that she recoiled and jumped to keep the balance. Afterwards she repeated the same procedure as with her other swords. She wiped her sword clean with a piece of cloth ripped from the dead soldier and after retracting it she inserted the hilt into one of her belt's pockets. She threw again the bloodstained rag into one of the bushes on the roadside. Then she grabbed the army sword, leaned the tip of it to the wound in the soldier's temple and inserted it with a strong push into his head. Coinneach realized why she has brought a dead elf with her on the other horse...

He went over to the palomino and untied the dead body from the saddle carefully with his broken fingers. He hissed painfully a few times. Afterwards he threw the dead body over his shoulder and crooked a little bit under the corpse's weight.  
„Where to?" he asked towards the woman.  
She slowly looked around the area watching the positions of the dead soldiers. Then she moved, walked towards a tree nearby on the edge of the forest and pointed with her hand. Coinneach brought the corpse to her.  
„Lean him with his chest against the tree and pull off your jacket." She said and looked at him.  
He laid down the dead elf into a kneeling position and leaned him against the tree as she told him. He undressed the jacket and again painfully hissed a few times. She took the jacket from his hands and started to put it on the dead elf. He saw, that she's struggling with the dead weight and helped her. She returned to the manacles lying on the ground, grabbed them and tied the dead elf's hands behind his back. Then she went over to the dead armsman and stowed the key back into the same pocket where it was before. She went to the dead crossbowman who was strangled before by Coinneach. She picked up the crossbow from the ground, took an arrow out of the soldier's quiver, placed it in the crossbow and drew it. He stepped aside from the dead elf and watched her. She aimed, held her breath for a moment and took a shot. The arrow strongly pierced the elf's body right between his ribs where the heart is.  
„Nice shot." He said appreciatively.  
„Just because it's a crossbow. If it would be a normal bow, I'd let you shoot instead."  
He looked at her with a question in his eyes and she added: „I'm terrible in archery. I had to repeat the tests twice."  
„Tests?"  
„Never mind, I'll explain that to you later as well." She waived him off and laid the crossbow back to the ground next to the crossbowman's hand.

They both walked over to the horses. He noticed, that the greygreen blanket underneath the saddle has the same brown elven embroidery as her clothes. She untied the palomino's reins from her horse and threw them over the palomino's neck. Despite her relatively small height she swinged remarkably skillfully up to her horse's saddle.  
Coinneach walked up to the palomino, tapped the horse's neck while looking at the saddle on his back. Then he looked the horse over from head to toe.  
„Nice horse. Good saddle." He nodded and looked at the woman.  
„Don't ask, that would also take long to explain." She waived him off again and for this moment they were not talking about it anymore.  
He swinged up to the saddle and grabbed the reins with his sore hands. The woman looked slowly around again.  
„Good, we can leave. It will take some time until they figure out what happened here and that it's not you."  
"What about him?" spoke Coinneach behind her back.  
She turned in her saddle and looked what his eyes are aiming at. He was looking at the armsman's horse with an arrow in his side.  
"He's injured, he would hold us back. The wound is not too deep. If they take care of him, he should be fine." she replied and then tilted her head a bit looking down at the dead armsman. A malicious smirk appeared on her face, when she added: „And I like the scene..."  
He said nothing, just looked back at her with a cold motionless face.  
She spurred her horse and trotted towards the forest.

He was watching her back for a while, then looked around and his sight stopped on the silhouette of Fort Drakenborg in the distance. The woman stopped on the edge of the forest, turned her horse around and watched him. He was looking for a long time at the fort. Then he turned his head to her, nodded in agreement and spurred his palomino towards her.


	4. Chapter 4

They went through the forests in a fast trot and every time, when they reached a clearing, they spurred the horses into a gallop. They were already quite far and the dusk began to fall. None of them has spoken yet.  
Suddenly they saw between the trees a road ahead of them. They went along the road staying hidden in the forest and slowed down, when they heard noises from a nearby settlement. They carefully approached on their horses and observed the first houses. Keaira noticed, that his hands are shaking a bit. She realized, that the air grew cold and he's only in his shirt, barely sitting in the saddle tired and with chattering teeth. She silently reached out into one of her saddle's pockets, pulled out her folded cloak and handed it over to him without saying a word. He looked at her hand with the cloak, then into her eyes and proudly turned his face away.  
„As you wish..." she said with disgust and stowed the cloak again into the pocket.  
She jumped down from her horse and walked on foot towards the settlement between the trees. She was gone for a long time and his whole body started to visibly shake from the cold now. It was early fall and the temperature was promptly dropping after sunset. When she returned, she shook her head and swinged back up to her saddle. He gave her a questioning look.  
„There are only humans there. That wouldn't be a good idea." she replied, when she saw his gaze. He nodded silently and suddenly stretched out his hand towards her.  
„Is the cold already bigger than your hatred against the Dh'oine?" she asked sarcastically. He bit his tongue instead of answering her and kept his hand stretched out.  
She was looking at him for a while, then she bended, pulled out her cloak from the pocket again and stuffed it into his hand. He nodded gratefully, threw it over his shoulders and fastened up the buckle on the cloak.  
„I see, it's still not that cold to say ‚thank you'." she reacted to it with another scathing remark. He said nothing, just spurred his horse again into a trot through the forest.

They've passed by two more villages on their way until they've found a remote small settlement. She could hear his stomach rumbling and right after that her own as well. They had both nothing to eat since yesterday evening. _Let's hope we'll have some luck now..._ she thought when she jumped down from her horse and quietly walked over to the first houses in the darkness.  
They had. She noticed with a smile on her face, that a female elf walked out of a house with a sleeping child on her hands and then entered another house a bit further away. At the other end of the settlement the door opened on a small tavern and a tall blackhaired elf went outside, followed by a half-elf.  
„So good night and tell your wife, that the soup was really excellent." said the tall elf to the half-elf and walked up to his horse.  
„I'll do, good night and drop by our tavern some time again." the half-elf waived with his hand, went inside and Keaira heard, how the door bar snapped into place. The blackhaired elf swinged up to his horse's saddle, spurred him into a trot and disappeared in the forest nearby.  
She returned back to Coinneach, took her horse's reins and said without looking at him: „I think, we'll get finally something to eat."  
He jumped down from the palomino, also took his reins and followed her. They silently crossed the settlement, walked up to the tavern's door and Keaira knocked.  
The door bar rattled and the half-elf opened the door: „Did you forget something?" he asked with a smile, but immediately noticed them and looked frightened at them both.  
Standing in front of him was a small human woman wearing dirty elven clothes and behind her a tall elf in a dark cloak. Exhaustion, a broken nose and bruises on his face, hunger and cold in his eyes. The woman quietly pulled out of a small pouch on the front side of her belt a tiny object and handed it over to him. The half-elf gulped and looked at her palm, in which a small emerald was glittering. He carefully took it from her hand, then quickly looked around, stepped aside and whispered quietly: „Sit down by the fireplace, I'll take your horses to the stables." They both gratefully nodded and entered the tavern passing him by.

* * *

Vascoigne, the commander of Fort Drakenborg, was nervously pacing around the room and lashing the side of his jackboot with his quirt.  
„Are you trying to tell me, that the whole escort is just simply lying around there dead, with them also Dá Reo, nobody has seen or heard anything, and nothing is missing?!" he bawled at the breathless man in a uniform standing in the doorway.  
„Y-yes sir..." stuttered the obviously frightened soldier, who just came running to tell him, that the regular messenger, who has been riding between Dillingen and Drakenborg, has found one days' ride away from the Fort the whole escort and the prisoner lying dead on the road.  
„What do you take me for, an idiot?!" screamed Vascoigne so loud, that the soldier winced and hit the door jamb with his shoulder.  
„Shall I go and have a look at it?" asked with a cold voice the second man, who was in the room with Vascoigne. It was a tall muscular man wearing a hunting suit. He was sitting on a chair behind Vascoigne's table with his legs in high boots put up on the table. There were several knifes inserted in the pockets of his jacket and on his thighs, next to him a sword and a bow with a quiver were leaning against the wall. His long red hair was at one side of his head intersected by a broad scar, which was framed by a strip of grey hair. He had several additional ugly scars on his face and a part of his nose was missing. Cold and sinister steelgrey eyes were completing his overall horrifying look.  
Vascoigne nodded: „We'll go together, I want to see that with my own eyes!" he replied with a commanding tone to the second man and determinedly walked towards the door. The second man stood up, took his weapons and followed him without saying a word.

* * *

They walked up to the table nearest to the fireplace. Given the late night hours there was nobody else in the tavern except for them. They sat down with relief on two chairs opposite to each other. Coinneach unbuttoned the cloak and threw it over his chair. Keaira unbuttoned her elven jacket and also threw it over her chair. She was silently watching the slowly bleeding wound on his shoulder. His gaze stopped for a moment on her breasts pronounced under her blouse and then skipped to her face.  
„What's your name, Dh'oine?" he broke the silence between them after a while.  
She scowled at him angrily. She was fed up with the constant ‚Dh'oine' she heard from him all the time.  
„Keaira."  
„Keaira... and?" he looked into her eyes.  
„Keaira Ther'eyllis." She replied after short hesitation, when she noticed, that his question is sincere and the snooty look from his eyes has disappeared.  
„Strange name." He hasn't stopped staring into her eyes.  
„It's an elven name." She replied and when she saw his skeptical look, she added: „Not your elven name, it's not originating from the Aen Seidhe. The Aen Muire have given me that name. When they've found me, I was too young to remember my own."  
He had an apparent surprise on his face. Before any one of them could speak, the door behind her slammed and the half-elf has entered the tavern. Keaira only slightly turned her head and watched him from the corner of her eye. He came close to their table, quickly looked at her embroidered elven jacket, then at Coinneach's nose, shoulder and fingers and cleared his throat:  
„I'll get a healer, my wife will bring you some food and drinks in the meantime." he turned towards the low door to the kitchen next to the fireplace and shouted: „Bring the soup and a bread, Mairead. We have guests." Then he looked at them once again and added: „And bring also the rest of the roasted pork and some wine. The soup won't be enough..."  
Keaira smiled at him: „Thank you."  
The half-elf returned the smile and nodded, then he looked at Coinneach and said: „We always help our own..."  
Then he went outside and the door quietly closed behind him.

For a while they were again staring at each other silently until a woman didn't appear in the kitchen door. She was a bit sturdy, but quite attractive, had a friendly smile on her face and in her hands two plates with a soup and half of a bread. She was human just like Keaira. She placed everything on the table in front of them and handed over to them a small jar with cutlery from a nearby table. Then she turned and went back into the kitchen.  
They silently took the spoons and started to eat the soup. His hunger was too big to ask her any further questions now and she was too tired to start the whole complicated explanation.  
The door quietly squeaked, the half-elf entered and behind him an elf with golden blond hair with his hands full of small pouches. They both nodded and the elf placed the pouches on a nearby table, walked up to Coinneach and examined him slowly.  
„I'll need hot water and bring also some vodka for disinfecting the wound." Then he looked at Coinneach's nose and fingers and quietly asked: „Can you handle it, brother?" Coinneach finished eating the soup, laid the spoon aside and silently nodded.  
The half-elf went to the kitchen and returned a moment later with the requested hot water in a small pot and a bottle of vodka. He placed it on the table and disappeared again in the kitchen.  
Keaira finished eating her soup, slightly nodded to the healer and followed the half-elf and his wife into the kitchen. They were quietly whispering something to each other. She spoke to them with a soft voice: „We don't want to cause any trouble. I'm really grateful for your help. And for the healer, but we should..."  
The half-elf's wife interrupted her: „Don't even think about going somewhere now! I was just telling my husband to prepare a hot bath for you in the morning. You both need it." And she smiled at her. Keaira realized how awfully they both with Coinneach must look.  
Then the half-elf added: „We have one guestroom, I'll prepare it for you. We don't have often guests over night." he turned and went to the narrow stairs leading up to the upper floor on the other side of the kitchen.  
Keaira was looking at his wife for a while, then returned the smile: „Thank you again." The innkeeper's wife wanted to reply something, but suddenly a muffled scream from the next room could be heard. Keaira was with two fast leaps at the kitchen door and placed her hand already on her belt, when she entered the front room. She was stopped by the surprised gaze of the blond elf. He was just holding in his hand one of Coinneach's outstretched fingers and applied a mixture of healing herbs to it. Both elves were slightly startled by the way she barged into the room.  
„I'm sorry..." she whispered and walked backwards with a lowered head back into the kitchen.  
„He'll be fine sweetie, don't worry, Jarlath is an experienced healer." The half-elf's wife smiled at her again. Keaira nodded with an ashamed smile: „I think I'd like to have some of that wine now, if you don't mind..."

She was sitting in the kitchen with the innkeeper's wife, they were having a small talk and when the half-elf came back from the upper floor, he joined them in their chit-chat. After a longer time the blond elf appeared in the doorway to the kitchen.:  
„I'm done. Only two fingers were broken, the rest is just badly beaten. I've straightened his nose. The wound on his shoulder is sutured and I've applied an ointment to the bruise under his eye as well as to his wrists. He has a few more bruises on his chest and legs, but that should be all right in a few days."  
„How much do we owe you?" asked Keaira.  
„Nothing." replied the elf and added towards the half-elf: „And I don't want anything from you either."  
All three of them have looked in surprise at him when he continued: „I did it for free and gladly. I think I know, who he is..."  
Keaira's face turned from surprised to suspicious, but the elf quickly added: „Maybe we should all talk openly..." and he nodded towards the door to the front room. „And we could use some of that wine as well..." his gaze stopped at the jug, from which the half-elf's wife and Keaira have been pouring the wine out before.  
Keaira silently looked at them all and then she followed the healer into the front room. The half-elf took a big plate with the rest of the roasted pork and another bread, his wife refilled the wine jug and took with the other hand a tray with clean cups.  
They all sat down at the table, Coinneach and Keaira started to eat the pork with bread and the innkeeper's wife poured some wine for all of them into their cups.  
After a few bites Coinneach couldn't stand it anymore and asked: „So talk brother, what's going on..." and took a swig of wine.  
„I recognized you by the scar on your ear. You're Coinneach Dá Reo, right?" asked the healer outright.  
Coinneach was eyeballing him for a while and then he nodded: „I had the feeling we've met already before..."  
„In Brokilon. Shortly before the war started. You were just leaving to the south, when I've arrived." continued the elf also with a short nod. „You were advising Milwa to stay in Brokilon back then."  
„I hope she listened to my advice. How's our sister?" Coinneach smiled, but the smile froze immediately on his face as he saw the blond elf slowly and with a serious face shake his head.  
„Fuck!" slipped from Coinneach's lips, but he quickly regained his self-control and took another swig of wine. They were all silent now and the innkeeper's wife filled their cups again. „I told her back then, that it's our duty to go to this war, that it's our baptism of fire... She warned me, that this fire will burn us all up... She was right..." added Coinneach quietly.  
„Ehm... That's not all..." whispered the healer. Keaira noticed how Coinneach's jaw hardened.  
„How much do you know about the fate of the other Scoia'tael?" asked the blond elf carefully.  
„Almost nothing since the time they've arrested us. I mean myself and the other officers of the Vrihedd brigade. And they've separated us, when we've arrived in Dillingen..."  
The blond elf nodded and took a big swig from his cup. Keaira and the half-elf with his wife were for now only quietly watching the two elves.  
„The Scoia'tael were scattered to the four winds after the war. At least what was left from their commandos..." the blond elf paused for a while and then he quickly spilled out the rest as if each word would burn in his mouth: „Some ran to Brokilon, others in small groups mainly to Temeria and Aedirn. A few went even to Dol Blathanna, but Enid an Gleanna expelled them from there..."  
Coinneach gritted his teeth.  
„When they brought you to Dillingen, they've picked a few of you and the rest went with a large troop of soldiers heading for the Ravine of the Hydra..."  
Keaira cleared her throat and to their surprise interrupted the healer while looking into Coinneach's eyes: „They've chosen in Dillingen only you, Isengrim, Angus and Riordain." Her eyes jumped to the blond elf. „The others went with that troop."  
The elf nodded and continued: „Iorveth managed to escape in the first night. Only he did..." he gulped heavily, then he raised his cup and drank everything at once. „The others ended up dead in that ravine..." he dropped his head and the fists on his hands placed on the table were clenched.  
It was dead silent now in the tavern. The half-elf and his wife also dropped their heads. Keaira was holding her forehead with a hand and said with a distressed voice: „Oh no! Too late... It's too late..." and stared at the empty plate in front of her.  
Coinneach was observing her for a while, then he turned towards the blond elf: „I don't believe it! And I won't until I see this myself!"  
„Don't go there brother, it's a grim sight. Deagan was here just a while ago. He came directly from there..."  
Coinneach raised one eyebrow: „Deagan lives?"  
„Yes, a few Scoia'tael stayed here. Fugitives from different commandos. They're hiding in the forest nearby..." nodded the healer.  
„They drop by from time to time to stock up on supplies, or to eat something." said the half-elf suddenly.  
„Or I treat their wounds if necessary." added the blond elf.  
They were quietly drinking their wine for a while. Then Coinneach spoke: „Thank you, brother."  
„How did you manage to escape?" the healer asked him.  
Coinneach looked at Keaira. She was still holding her forehead with her hand leaned on the table and was staring utterly devastated at her empty plate. The other elf looked at her, then back at Coinneach and he understood.  
„If they were taking you to Drakenborg and you've managed to escape Vascoigne's men, he'll send someone to bring you back..."  
„I think that might take a while..." Keaira interrupted him with a cold look on her face: „There's an elf wearing the officer's jacket of the Vrihedd brigade lying dead on the road to Drakenborg along with the whole escort..."  
The blond elf raised one corner of his mouth to a smirk: „Interesting solution." then he turned to Coinneach and continued again with a serious face: „Aodhan is working for him and you can't trick him, you know this yourself..."  
Coinneach visibly twitched and threw a rough look at the healer. The elf added after a while: „You need three things: new clothes, new weapons and some rest – at least for two or three days. I strongly recommend the last one and at the same time it's enough for me to get you the first an the second."  
Coinneach took a breath and already wanted to disagree, but the healer stopped him with a fast move of his hand: „If you stay up there," he nodded with his head towards the guest room upstairs, „then Aodhan will pass by here in the meantime. I'll take care of it, that he follows a wrong trail..."  
Keaira looked at everyone and stopped her gaze on the blond elf: „Why do you want to help us so much, if you even didn't want to take anything for the wound treatment?" she had suspicion in her voice.  
The elf smiled at her: „Because we all help each other, sister. After all you've helped him as well..."  
This was the first time on this world, that an elf had friendly smiled at her and talked to her with respect. She returned the smile and nodded gratefully.  
The half-elf slowly stood up, looked at Coinneach and then at Keaira: „You gave us more than enough. I'd be happy, if you take Jarlath's advice and stay for a few days." and he turned to his wife with a smile. „I'll prepare a hot bath for them in the morning. We should go to bed dear, it's quite late."  
The innkeeper's wife also stood up, smiled as well and pushed the wine jug towards Keaira and Coinneach: „If you'd like to sit here a bit longer... The guest room is upstairs on the right side."  
After that they both said good night and went away through the kitchen. The blond elf stood up, picked up all his pouches with the healing herbs and ointments and looked at Coinneach. He was waiting.  
„Thank you for your help, Jarlath. I really appreciate it. And I will listen to your advice." said Coinneach to him. They both nodded to each other and the blond elf went out to the dark quiet night. The door silently closed behind him and Keaira has placed the door bar on the door's hooks just like the half-elf did before.

When she turned away from the door, she looked at Coinneach sitting behind the table. He pushed away with his hand the empty plates to the table's edge, filled their cups in front of him with wine and waived with the other hand towards her chair:  
„I'd like to pay my debt now and listen to what you have to say, Keaira Ther'eyllis."  
She sighed deeply. She was extremely tired and she knew, that it will be hard to explain the whole thing to him in an understandable way. She wanted to sleep.  
It was as if he would read her mind: „Make it short if you want. I can ask about the details tomorrow as well..."  
She nodded, sat down on her chair again and took a swig of wine. Then she took a deep breath and started:  
„Except for the Aen Seidhe, there are two other big groups of elves: the Aen Elle and the Aen Muire. They live on other worlds, not here. The Aen Elle are by now on a higher stage of development as you the Aen Seidhe and they've only very recently joined the Elven Federation. The Elven Federation is an association of many Aen Muire worlds and some other smaller elven groups. The Aen Muire are yet another thousands of years ahead of you all – their civilization, culture, sociopolitical norms, technologies..." she looked at him for a while, because she awaited a scornful laughter from him, that she's telling him fairytales. But he was listening motionless and with a serious face. He drank a bit from his cup and waited.  
„The Aen Seidhe on this world are slowly dying out. For centuries you're killing each other with humans. The Aen Elle have conquered the worlds on which they live. They have eradicated the humans living there and kept only a few alive to serve them as slaves. That was by the way the main problem, when they've negotiated their admission to the Federation. But I'm deviating from the subject... The Aen Muire have always lived with the humans in peace. Since the very beginning. They've respected and learned from each other. When the Aen Muire mastered the way of travelling between he worlds and settled on new ones, they've agreed with the humans, that they'll relinquish to the humans the world from which they've originated. They wanted to avoid right from the start any conflicts or disagreements, that would sooner or later arise, because the human population was growing much faster than the elven one."  
She remained silent for a while again and drank a bit of wine.  
„Please continue." said Coinneach and his eyes haven't stopped watching her.  
„Ehm..." she cleared her throat again and thought about how to explain the rest to him as simple as possible. „Unfortunately, as it turned out, the humans are a too aggressive race even towards each other. After a few centuries they destroyed in huge consecutive wars themselves and the world both they and the Aen Muire originated from..." she gulped. „Only a few humans have remained. They fled in very small groups to other worlds and there they are slowly dying out. Maybe it's better this way..." she added quietly and stayed silent again looking at the wine in her cup.  
Coinneach was listening to her and her last remark surprised him. He didn't expect to hear it from a human. He slowly filled their cups with wine again.  
„Continue, Keaira. Please." he repeated the word 'please' again and this time she could see in his eyes, that he's sincere.  
„The Aen Muire have not condemned the humans despite that. They help them until today and they've welcomed with open arms those, that fled to elven worlds. But not with the same kind of respect anymore. A few human groups have secluded themselves on worlds, where nobody else lives, no elves as well. The life conditions there are too bad, but those last ones didn't have much choice when they fled... They couldn't reach the elven worlds anymore. I come from one of such worlds..."  
„You've mentioned, that they've found you..." Coinneach nodded.  
„Yes. I don't know what has happened. As I said, I was too young to remember anything. I only know, that I was the only one, who survived there as a small child... Until today nobody wants to tell me, what has happened there back then. The Aen Muire who have found me, took me to Gwaeloth. That's the capital world of the Elven Federation. There one elven family adopted me, gave me my name, raised me..." then she couldn't resist and looked at him angrily: „I grew up amongst you, my parents are elves, all my friends are elves, I understand the humans even less than you and your constant disdainful 'Dh'oine' is really offending me." she bit her tongue and turned her head away towards the fireplace. „I'm sorry, I got side-tracked..."  
„I understand. Even though it's quite hard to believe it all now. But if you'd be lying, I would see that." he interrupted her and then he shortly added with an unexpected friendly tone in his voice: „I won't call you like that again. I own to you at least that much for saving my life."  
She looked at him with a huge surprise on her face. He suddenly smiled: „And I can even say 'thank you'."  
She returned the smile and for a while they were silently looking at each other. Then she continued:  
„The Elven Federation is just one part of the so called Great Union. It's an economic-sociopolitical coalition of many races from many worlds. There are three main key players almost equally sharing the power within the Union. The Elves, the Z'evelians and the Aardaqs. I'll explain to you the details later, otherwise we wouldn't have enough time even during the whole next two or three days now..." she smiled apologetically. He nodded without saying a word.  
She sighed: „And now the more difficult and unpleasant part." she drank up her wine and he again refilled both their cups.  
„The Elves and the Aardaqs have recently discovered at the same time a few new habitable worlds. Both sides are staking a claim to these worlds. Both sides are obviously not interested in the fact, that an another race is living on some of those already..." she had bitterness in her voice. „During the last Great Union assembly it was decided, that the Elves and the Aardaqs have to settle this among themselves. The Union considers this to be just a local conflict and the other races refuse to get involved in this. Approximately in ten months the negotiations will start within the Union area as neutral territory, where both sides should reach an agreement. But both sides are too stubborn to abandon their claims."  
„Are you expecting a war?"  
„Yes, although both the Elves and the Aardaqs are preparing for it secretly. Of course, they'll send the best representatives they have to the negotiations and they'll try to reach a peaceful agreement. But each side wants to have an advantage over the other if the negotiations fail..."  
„Politics has always been a sordid business..." now he had bitterness in his voice as well. He raised his cup and looked at her. She nodded, raised her cup as well and they drank some wine.  
„And now I'm actually getting to the point why I'm here. As I said, the Union doesn't want to be involved in this and if the Elves and the Aardaqs start a war, nobody will care about how the conflict ends for both parties. The only thing the Union will care about, is the compliance with the so called Codex. If one of those two races violates the Codex, they will be excluded from the Union, which will have wide-ranging negative economic and political consequences for that race. Not to mention, that the main representatives will be judged as war criminals. And that for some groups within the Union this conflict will be convenient as they'll be able to strengthen their own positions within the Union in the meantime."  
„And what is stated in that Codex?"  
„Amongst other things, that if we wage war directly on a world, where already an another civilization on a lower stage of development exists, then none of the parties involved is allowed to use new modern weapons..."  
He started to get the hint from her story.  
„It would be a slaughter, not a war, do you understand? That Codex was established by the Great Union after the first Aardaq-Z'evelian war. Both sides have literally in hours destroyed with newest weapons during their conflict an entire evolving civilization... It was simply standing in their way..." she was looking at him with sad eyes. „It was at the very beginning, when the Union was not yet stable enough and it almost disintegrated at that time, which would've been a great loss mostly for all the smaller races. One of the main laws of the Union is to give everyone a chance." she drank a bit from her wine again.  
„So in case, that the negotiations will not end well and a war breaks out, it'll be carried out in many different ways. One of the most important will be the ground offensive directly on those worlds. In the end it will be about who will seize them. That race living there is currently in the same stage of development as you are here and they use very similar weapons..."  
„And how is that related to me?" he asked although he already guessed what her answer will be.  
„The governors of the Elven Federation decided on a secret meeting, that they'll break their own rules." a slight irony could be heard in her voice now. „Only very few still have excellent proficiency in using such outdated weapons as you have. To gain advantage in this kind of war, the governors have send secretly a few like me to some elven worlds like yours, although it is strictly forbidden to visit these worlds – there's a specific elven Codex for that as well by the way, which was established a long time ago by the Federation itself. Each one of us got a list with names. The names of elves, who are masters in tactics and strategy, waging wars and in the use of these old weapons. From what I've read, obviously also masters in the necessary cruelty and ruthlessness..." she gave him a cold stare. He returned it.  
„Now I understand it. And who's on your list?"  
„Fourteen names. In this order: Isengrim Faoiltiarna, Angus Bri Cri, Riordain, Iorveth, Coinneach Dá Reo, Ciaran aep Dearbh, Ciaran aep Easnillen..." she said one after another the names of fourteen most feared officers of the Vrihedd brigade or members of the Scoia'tael and added sarcastically: „The governor told me, that without Faoiltiarna I don't even have to come back..."  
Coinneach was silently looking at her for a while and then drank up everything from his cup. The flames in the fireplace were slowly dying.  
„So to summarize: some elves about whom I've never heard of, have send to our world a human female to look for fourteen Scoia'tael who hate nothing more than humans, to convince them to leave their own world, abandon their brothers and sisters who fight here for their freedom and their rights, make a journey into the unknown and fight there a war because of a conflict, which has nothing to do with our world..." he gave her a cold stare. „Do you realize how ludicrous that sounds...?"  
„I do. That's exactly why I didn't want to come here and asked for a replacement with someone else." she replied with the same cold stare. Then she suddenly stood up, took her jacket and left without saying a word.  
Coinneach slowly drank the rest of the wine, then he also stood up and watched the charcoal in the fireplace for a moment. He turned, took her cloak from the chair and went upstairs to the guest room. When he entered, she was just taking away a thick woolen blanket from the bed and walked up to a rocking chair standing in the corner next to a small table underneath a window. She unbuckled her belt with swords and untied the leather sheath with a knife from her thigh and left it all lying at the table's edge. Dressed as she was, she enwrapped the blanket around herself and sat down in the chair. Without saying anything she closed her eyes, tilted her head a bit to the side and nestled down to find the best position to sleep.  
„You can sleep in the bed, I'm used to sleeping on the ground." he said to her, when he closed the door.  
„Sleep, Coinneach. You need it now more than me." she replied with closed eyes in a tone, that stopped any further discussion about the topic. He sat down on the bed's edge exhausted, took his boots off and stretched himself out on the bed. In just a few minutes his chest was moving in a regular rhythm of a deep sleep. Keaira was watching him with squinted eyes. _A fiasco... Total disaster..._ rushed through her head shortly before falling into an uneasy poor sleep.

* * *

Vascoigne, the other man and two soldiers were galloping through the dark night on the road to Dillingen. They wanted to reach the dead escort as soon as possible in the early morning. At dawn the horribly looking redhaired man in the front slowed down his horse and walked up to the first soldier's corpse lying on the road. He jumped down from his horse and the others followed. Vascoigne silently looked around the area and turned to the man:  
„What do you think about it, Aodhan?"  
The tall redhaired man quietly reached into one of his pant's pockets, pulled out a short leather band and tied his long hair to a ponytail at the back of his head. Two pointed elven ears emerged from underneath his hair...  
„Stay where you are, I need to look thoroughly at the footprints in the dust." said the mutilated elf with a cold voice and remained standing on one place.

They were standing there for almost an hour without moving until the sun wasn't high enough in the sky to see the whole surrounding area clearly and sharply. Aodhan slowly moved and started to watch the tracks coming from Dillingen.  
„What's the weight of your messenger and what kind of a horse does he have?"  
„His weight is about the same as this one has." nodded Vascoigne with his head towards one of the two soldiers, who were accompanying them. Aodhan turned and looked the soldier over from head to toe in detail.  
„And the horse?"  
„All of our horses are almost the same. We use..." the mutilated elf stopped Vascoigne in the middle of the sentence with a quick waive of his hand and was now looking the horse over from head to toe thoroughly. Then he turned back to the tracks on the road and to the injured horse standing nearby, behind which a dead armsman was lying on the ground with his right foot trapped in the stirrup. He started to circle around him in a wide arc. Behind the injured horse's back he stopped for a while watching the tracks coming from the forest. After that he continued along the tracks on the road towards Dillingen for another hundred feet. His eyes were pinned to the tracks in the dust constantly measuring them. Then he turned and returned back to Vascoigne.  
„Two other horses. Two riders, one was female."  
Vascoigne looked at him in disbelief, but the elf waived him off again with his hand: „I'm not about to explain anything to you, it is as I said."  
Afterwards he slowly started to inspect the corpses, he bended over them and carefully examined their injuries.  
„Elven swords. The attacker was fast and without mercy."  
„I knew, that his pals will try to get this asshole out of this!" snarled Vascoigne furiously. He looked at the dead elf in the officer uniform of the Vrihedd brigade with an arrow in his back leaned towards a nearby tree and sizzled maliciously: „You've almost made it, you son of a bitch!"  
The mutilated redhaired elf straightened up from one of the dead corpses in front of him and looked at Vascoigne hatefully. Then he turned away and was watching for a while the footprints of female elven jackboots in the dust. He walked over to the dead soldier with a sword in his head and was looking at the sword in his temple for a long time. After that he turned and watched the disemboweled crossbowman, raised his sight and looked at the dead elf. He started to walk towards him, but stopped in the middle of the distance. Right in front of him were the tracks of two horses leading towards the forest. _Again one male and one female rider..._ He squinted his eyes and looked with suspicion at the dead elf in the black jacket in front of him. Suddenly something came to his mind and he quickly went over to the dead body. He bended and pushed back the dead elf's hair behind his left ear. He raised his gaze to Vascoigne standing nearby and waived him over with two fingers. The other two soldiers remained standing on their places.  
Vascoigne came close to Aodhan with a questioning look. But the redhaired elf only silently pointed with his fingers to the dead elf's ear. Vascoigne looked at the left ear on the dead corpse, then back to the mutilated elf in front of him.  
„A pointed ear. So what? He's a fucking elf, isn't he?" Vascoigne shrugged his shoulders dull-witted.  
Aodhan's look hardened and he sizzled angrily: „This is not Coinneach Dá Reo!"  
Vascoigne's face immediately turned pale. "Are you sure?" he whispered.  
"Absolutely. Coinneach Dá Reo has on his left ear an old deep scar. And I know this for sure because he has it from me!" the mutilated elf continued to sizzle angrily but quietly so that the two soldiers don't hear them.  
In that moment Vascoigne's face turned from pale to red. „Fuck! The others must not know, do you understand me, elf?!" the commander of Fort Drakenborg furiously continued to whisper. „If this gets out, that he escaped me and that I haven't followed the order and didn't hang him in the Fort, I'll loose my head! And you can look for a new job! Fucking elves! I could do without this..." Vascoigne was foaming at his mouth while Aodhan's face started to wrinkle in a terrible grimace. „Fucking pointy-eared rats! They should have cut their throats right there in Dillingen when they've arrived..."  
He didn't finish anymore as the mutilated elf's hands flew up suddenly, grabbed Vascoigne's collar underneath his chin and drew his face towards Aodhan's, stopping just an inch away. The tall elf started to straighten up still holding Vascoigne's collar. Vascoigne's feet were now barely touching the ground with their toes.  
„You should watch the way how you're talking and to whom, Vascoigne!" said the redhaired elf with a deadly cold voice and pure hatred was in his eyes. „Don't forget who I am! I'm not your servant and the fact, that I'm doing the dirty work for you doesn't mean, that I'm going to listen to this slander!"  
„Calm down, they're looking at us..." objected Vascoigne quietly and tried to loosen the elf's grip, but the elf was much stronger than him.  
„What do I care?! That's your problem, just like this unknown dead elf!" Aodhan continued to hold him relentlessly on his tiptoes. „I can leave whenever I want. And leave this damned mess to you!" the elf was coldly speaking. „Or I can help you to quietly fix this. It's up to you... But surely not, if you don't start to watch your tongue!" he added cynically.  
„I'll pay you! I'll pay!" blurted out Vascoigne quickly in fear.  
The elf's hands slowly released him back to the ground: „You'll pay. And a lot!" Aodhan was watching him from above.  
Vascoigne silently nodded and fixed the collar on his uniform. Then he shouted at the two soldiers standing not far away: „Don't stand there like cattle! Take the dead prisoner and let's go back! The order was to bring him to Drakenborg and that's what we're going to do!"  
The two soldiers were looking at each other in surprise for a while, then one of them shrugged his shoulders and they walked over to Vascoigne, Aodhan and the dead elf.  
The redhaired elf returned to his horse and swinged up to the saddle. „I'll go immediately. They have a head start of at least a day. Give me everything you have now!"  
Vascoigne was too afraid to oppose him. He walked up to his horse, reached into one of his saddle's pockets and pulled out a small full bag. Coins clattered in it. He threw it towards the elf. Aodhan skilfully catched the bag in the air and stowed it in a pocket on his saddle. Then he nodded to Vascoigne and spurred his horse into a fierce gallop following the trail of the male's and female's horses. He was the whole time thinking about who that insanely effective female elf might have been, who managed to kill the whole escort...


	5. Chapter 5

She woke up from her bad sleep with such a hard twitch, that the rocking chair in which she was sitting has moved. Her face was illuminated by the morning autumn sun shining through the window. She quickly looked at the bed. Coinneach was lying there with his head leaned against the headboard and was watching her.  
„Don't you think it's a bit hypocritical, that you as a human don't have really the best opinion about humans because of their aggressiveness and at the same time you don't mind to support now the elves in the same behavior?" he broke the silence.  
She stared at him for a while: „What do you want to hear from me, Coinneach? That I'm doing it because it was an order and nobody asked about my opinion?"  
„Don't hide behind orders. I heard very well the different undertones in your voice when you were speaking about humans and when about elves last night."  
„I can hardly explain that to someone... Well, anyone..." she remained silent for a moment. „Yes, I'm a human, but I grew up with elves only. I was raised according to your norms, your behavioral rules. Sometimes I don't understand you, but I understand the humans even less, because for years I haven't met any. I don't know where I belong to – I'm a human, but I'm different than they are. In that moment, when I speak, they hear an elf and they keep their distance. They cannot place me anywhere. It's similar with the elves. Unless they get to know me better, they only see the human in me and have a problem to accept me among themselves. For the humans I'm just a cold killer without a heart who turned against its own race. For the elves I'm too emotional with insufficient self-control. In a way I don't belong to neither of them..."  
He slightly tilted his head and was carefully listening to her.  
„Maybe I am really a hypocrite... Or you can even call me a racist... The humans never gave me anything good. That innkeeper's wife is probably the first human, whom I've met, who's friendly to me... The elves on the other hand gave me everything. A new life, the chance to be someone. They taught me how to see the beauty in the world around us, and the beauty in them... They always helped me, they never gave up on me. Even though it's sometimes not easy with me..." she sadly smiled. „Maybe it's only a feeling of gratitude or solidarity with you – I don't know... But I feel a strong bond with the elves, not with humans. I already had to make in my life a few decisions who's side I'm on and it was always the elves. Without a single doubt... So if supporting the elves ultimately means to break rules and kill in their name other races, then I'll do it..."  
She took a breath and wanted to add something, but in that moment somebody knocked on the door. The door slightly opened and the half-elf's wife looked inside with a smile: „I've brought you something for breakfast. I hope I didn't wake you up."  
„No no, it's all right." answered Keaira. „Thank you very much, that's very kind of you." and returned the smile.  
The innkeeper's wife went in and laid a tray onto the table. Then she turned and before closing the door behind her she added: „There's a hot bath prepared for you downstairs." She nodded towards Keaira and silently closed the door.

Coinneach stood up, filled their cups with herbal tea from a small jug and started to eat a bread with bacon. They were eating in silence.  
„Keaira..." he said after a while with a serious voice. „I have a few questions to what you've told me yesterday."  
She laid aside her half-eaten bread and took a sip from the tea. „Go ahead, ask, I'll answer all of your questions." Then she looked outside the window and added bitterly: „It probably doesn't matter anymore... It was really a mad idea..."  
To her big surprise his first question was: „If I theoretically agreed – what are you offering me for it and on what terms?"  
She stared at him in disbelief for a while. Then she quickly repeated to him everything what El ordered her to. At length. She didn't skip or hide anything. He was listening carefully to her the whole time. Every now and then he interrupted her to ask for further details. When she finished, he thought about it for a long time. Then he looked straight into her eyes:  
„Good. I have just one last question now. Will I ever be allowed to return back here?" he was piercing her with his gaze...  
She was silently looking into his olive-green eyes and slowly shook her head negatively. He squeezed his lips and turned his face towards the window and the forest behind it. She stood up without saying a word, went out and closed the door behind her.

When she came to the kitchen downstairs, she noticed in one corner behind a curtain a wooden tub filled with hot water. The half-elf's wife came from the front room and when she saw Keaira, she walked up to her.  
„Give me your clothes in the meantime, sweetie. I'll clean them and wash also the blouse. Until they dry out, you can wear a dress, that's left after our daughter..." her eyes darkened with sadness when she said the last sentence.  
„Thank you. I'm really grateful. And my name is Keaira." she smiled at he half-elf's wife and reached out her hand. The woman shook it happily: „I'm Mairead. And we already told you yesterday, that you've given us more than enough. We gladly help you." She had a bright warm friendly smile on her face.  
Keaira nodded, went behind the curtain and shortly after she was already immersed in pleasant hot water washing herself with a soap. After her bath she enwrapped herself in the prepared linen sheet and Mairead has brought her in a while a crimson dress with a bodice. Keaira smiled slightly amused when she looked at it. Mairead's daughter had obviously smaller charms as Keaira and when she put the dress on, she saw how Mairead scratched her head: „I think we need an additional scarf..." they both bursted out laughing. She politely rejected the cap, which Mairead handed her over, and tied her wet curly hair at the back of her head to a loose ponytail.

After Mairead had fixed the scarf on her cleavage, they heard the front door squeak. A moment later the healer appeared in the kitchen doorway. He was looking at Keaira quite surprised for a while and then the corner of his mouth twitched in a sneaky smile.  
„I almost didn't recognize you."  
„Ehm..." Keaira looked down at the dress she was wearing. „Well, I'm not really used to something like this..."  
„Coinneach?" asked Jarlath when the smile disappeared from his face.  
At the same time a door upstairs slammed and Coinneach was walking down the stairs into the kitchen. He looked at them all and his sight remained on Keaira. The surprised look on his face and the sneaky twitch of a corner of his mouth were just the same as Jarlath's a moment ago. Keaira rolled her eyes and went away from the kitchen into the front room. The innkeeper's wife followed and left the two elves alone.  
„I've brought you something." said Jarlath.  
„You went for it during the night?"  
„Yes. It would be quite stupid to go there during the day, don't you think?"  
Coinneach nodded approvingly.  
„How much of a head start do you have?"  
„My guess is, that we were about one day's ride away from Drakenborg."  
„In that case I won't wait any longer. If Vascoigne really sends Aodhan to catch you, then he'll be here around dusk."  
They were both looking at each other seriously.  
„What are you planning to do?"  
„Deagan sends his regards..." said Jarlath instead of answering the question and Coinneach understood.  
„The horses are in the stables." Coinneach nodded.  
Jarlath turned away and after a short while he brought from the front room in his hands new elven jackboots, gloves, pants, two shirts, a heavy elven armor jacket and a long winter cloak. All the clothes had a brown and darkgreen color with beautiful rich yellow and red embroidery. He laid everything down next to the wooden tub and turned away again to get the rest of the items. Coinneach looked at each piece of the clothing one after another and measured them. Jarlath has guessed his size exactly right.  
He came into the kitchen again, in one hand a belt with two elven slightly curved swords and a thigh-sheath with a big hunting knife, in the other hand a completely new elven recurve bow with a quiver full of arrows.  
„You have a good eye, Jarlath." Coinneach nodded to him appreciatively.  
The blond elf smiled and went out of the kitchen into the front room. Keaira was standing there and waiting, while Mairead was removing the ash from the fireplace and prepared some wood to light a new fire. Keaira stopped him.  
„Give this to them. Please." she grabbed his hand and laid something into his palm. Jarlath slowly spread his palm and looked at the small diamond glittering in his hand. He raised one eyebrow and looked at her.  
She smiled apologetically: „I had no time to sell them yet. I don't have your money."  
„They'll refuse it."  
„They don't need to know, that it's from me."  
„They'd do it for him for free." he nodded towards the kitchen and looked at her with a serious gaze.  
„I know, Jarlath. But if you and them are planning what I'm thinking, then you all deserve this for the risk." she returned a serious gaze to him as well. He nodded, smiled and hid the diamond in his jackboot.  
„I'll take your horses. I'll be back with them tomorrow evening."  
„It has to be two of you. One female..." she had a questioning look on her face.  
„I've already taken care of this." He nodded again and wanted to leave as she stopped him.  
„Wait, my horse won't go with you voluntarily..."  
He looked at her astounded.  
„He's specially trained. I'm going with you."  
And they both went to the stables. There they saddled up the horses and she slowly handed over the reins to him while saying a few short orders to her horse. Then she turned to Jarlath, gave him some instructions and told him a few orders to which the horse is used to. He was carefully listening to her and nodded at the end.  
„Watch out in the evening. And if you can, take a close look at Aodhan. It's always good to know whom you're dealing with..."  
„Thank you." she nodded gratefully.  
He went out of the stables and quickly waived over a slim female elf standing nearby dressed in a riding suit. They both swinged up to the horses' saddles and shortly after that they've disappeared silently in a trot in the forest next to the tavern.

* * *

Keaira tried to keep herself busy during the day in order not think about it, that Coinneach still hasn't answered anything to her proposal and that she still didn't know what his decision is going to be. She didn't want to waste time unnecessarily as she still didn't know anything about Iorveth's and Isengrim's fate. Faoiltiarna was the most important one and she needed to get to him quickly. As long as he lives. But she knew, that she has to give Coinneach some time to think about it all and especially to recover. She had no idea what she would do in his position if somebody would confront her with such an unbelievable story... She hanged up her clean washed clothes to dry in the guest room so that they don't attract too much attention outside.  
Coinneach entered the room. He was dressed in his new brown-darkgreen clothes after his bath and was holding in his hand a sheet with his old clothes enwrapped in it. He silently laid the knotted sheet into a corner, sat down on the bed's edge and slowly started to sharpen his two new swords. She watched him for a while. He seemed very different in his new elven clothes. He wasn't the exhausted shabby miserable elf anymore whom she's met the day before. His shoulders were proudly stretched out, his gaze concentrated and he didn't move a muscle on his face, when he was sharpening the swords with his sore hands. He was only holding a bit aside the two broken fingers tied together on his left hand to not strain them too much. The swelling on his broken nose and on the bruise in his face was shrinking.

She left him in the room and went to see Mairead. She offered her to help her out to serve the guests and so they were the whole day long cooking, serving food and drinks and from time to time they had a chit-chat in the kitchen when there wasn't so much to do. After dusk a group of five dwarves came to the tavern. They've eaten a bit and drank quite a lot of wine. Then they started to sing funny dwarven songs and made everyone in the tavern laugh. Keaira was sitting with Mairead in the kitchen and they were both laughing aloud as they heard their songs. The half-elf was during the day away to stock up on provisions and wine and when he returned in the evening, he stored everything in the storage room, greeted the regular guests and sat down at the dwarves' table, whom he all knew very well.

Coinneach was the whole time in the guest room upstairs sharpening his swords, the knife, adjusting the bow and thinking all the time about the whole situation. About the war and how Nilfgaard extradited them to the Nordlings, about how the Scoia'tael as he knew them before practically seized to exist. About how many of his friends, brothers in arms and others whom he knew were now dead. About how much the world has changed in the past few months and he didn't recognize it anymore. He didn't know himself what to do next. He remembered how he accepted the thought of his early death on his way to Drakenborg and that he didn't expect anything from life anymore. And suddenly this strange human woman was here who saved his life in the very last moment and gave him an offer, about which he would a few months back laugh at best. If he wouldn't be thinking right away that she simply lost her mind...

* * *

The horse of a new arriving guest snorted outside the tavern. It was almost dark now when he heard a strong man jump down from the horse. He carefully looked outside the front window down at the tavern's entrance. The burning torch placed next to the front door illuminated the man's red hair intersected by a broad scar framed with a strip of grey hair. Coinneach didn't hesitate for a second. He immediately opened the room's door, ran down to the middle of the stairs and bended to have a look inside the kitchen from above. Keaira was just washing up some cups and placed them on a clean tray.  
„Keaira!" he whispered quietly. She turned and saw the look on his face. He silently stretched out his hand and pointed with a finger towards the front room. She understood. She quietly nodded and showed him with her hand to go back to the guest room. Keaira quickly checked with her eyes the scarf covering her cleavage. She had an elven tattoo, that started right above her right breast and Aodhan must not see it under any circumstances... She fixed the scarf, took a new wine jug for the dwarves into her hand and went to the front room.

Just as she has entered the room, the tavern's front door opened. A tall man was standing in the doorway almost touching the door's lintel with his head. Everyone in the tavern was suddenly silent at the mere sight of him. He had a terribly scarred face and a part of his nose was missing. A sinister gaze flashed in his steelgrey eyes. The dwarves regained their countenance as the first one's and started to sing another funny song. A few guests shortly looked at the arriving man and quickly returned back to their food, drinks or conversations. The innkeeper sitting at the dwarves' table was thoroughly watching the man. The tall man entered and closed the door behind himself. Then he slowly went over to a small table in the corner and sat down so that he could see everyone in the room and also the front door. He pulled off his hunting jacket and waited.

Keaira placed the wine jug on the dwarves' table, winked with one eye at the half-elf and walked up to the scarred man's table. With a surprise she realized, that he's an elf, when she saw the pointed ears emerging from underneath his hair. But her face didn't reveal anything and instead she forced herself to give him a slight smile.  
„What can I bring you?" she was quickly checking with her eyes his clothes, noticed the knives and the elven sword next to him while she hasn't stopped smiling.  
„Bring me some wine and a piece of meat with a bread." he snarled at her with a displeasing tone in his voice and carefully looked her over from head to toe. His gaze stopped at her covered breasts and a sleazy smirk appeared on his face. She nodded still smiling and went away into the kitchen. She looked at Mairead. The innkeeper's wife was obviously frightened.  
„That's all right, we'll try to get rid of him fast. The sooner the better." Keaira whispered to her, took a small wine jug and a cup and brought it to the redhaired elf. When she turned again towards the kitchen to get some meat and bread, he suddenly smacked her ass. She jumped and almost offhand slapped his face, but restrained herself in the very last moment. She suppressed her anger, turned her face to him and grinned with the best smile she could manage. He grinned back at her showing his small white elven teeth in a terrible grimace.  
She went into the kitchen and whispered quickly one curse after another. Mairead didn't understand a single one, but it wasn't necessary when she heard Keaira's tone...  
She took a piece of roasted meat and half of a bread and returned back to the mutilated elf.  
„Anything else?" Another forced smile.  
„Maybe when I finish my meal, sweetie..." he snarled with a sleazy tone and kept watching her breasts. She forced herself again into a smile and went over to a table, where a fat man with his wife was sitting. They've paid and stood up to leave.  
Suddenly the mutilated elf spoke aloud across the whole room:  
„Good man, it looks like you were here for a while with your wife. Tell me please before you leave, did you see an elven couple here before?"  
The tavern was dead silent again. The fat man was looking frightened at the mutilated elf and sharply shook his head.  
„No sir, we didn't see any elves here when we've arrived." He grabbed with a shaking hand his wife and slowly started to move towards the front door.  
„Are you sure?! An elf as tall as me, auburn hair, green eyes, with a scar on his left ear. There was a female elf with him. Smaller or very slim..." Aodhan was piercing the fat man with his gaze and a clear threat could be heard in his voice.  
The dwarves slowly reached out for their axes under the table and silently observed the scene. The half-elf stood up and cleared his throat: „Sir, no need to scare my guests if you want to ask something." Then he looked at Keaira – she tried to shut him up with her gaze, but he continued: „And there's no need to smack my daughter's arse as well. I can gladly tell you what you want to know even without it."  
The elf's sinister look jumped from the fat man to the half-elf next to the dwarves. He noticed their tense faces and hands hidden underneath the table just as Keaira did. The fat man with his wife literally ran out the front door and it slammed behind them.  
„Don't be so touchy, innkeeper." sizzled the mutilated elf. „I just wanted to have a bit fun with her."  
„There was an elven pair like the one you've described here before the dawn. They woke us up. I gave them something to eat and then I kicked them out. I didn't like them. I don't need any trouble!" snarled the half-elf back at him and fearlessly stared into the elf's eyes. The half-elf had elven blood in his veins and grew up with elves. He owned the tavern already for many years and has often helped fugitives or the Scoia'tael, whom later someone was asking him about. To lie so perfectly, that nobody would realize it, was something he has mastered already a long time ago.

Aodhan was silently closely watching him for over a minute, then he nodded and as if nothing had happened he started to eat the meat in front of him. Keaira shortly looked at the half-elf and went into the kitchen. The innkeeper sat down next to the dwarves again and after a while they started to sing a new song.  
When the mutilated elf finished his meal, he waived Keaira over: „I'd like to pay."  
He pulled out a bag with coins and threw a few onto the table. She collected them again with a forced smile, while he stood up and threw his hunting jacket over his shoulders. She already wanted to leave the table, when he suddenly grabbed her elbow, bended to her ear and whispered: „And now you'll be so kind and show me the horses in your stables."  
Dozens of thoughts quickly rushed through her head, but she was only angry in that moment, that she doesn't have her knife or her swords with her. She cautiously nodded and slowly started to walk towards the front door with the elf right behind her. The innkeeper stood up and wanted to walk over to them, but the elf stopped him with a quick waive of his hand: „Don't worry, pal, I won't hurt her. I just want to check something."  
Keaira slightly shook her head towards the half-elf to leave it be.

They went out of the tavern and turned towards the stables. Coinneach was watching them from a dark room through the window on the upper floor. He clenched his fists and a curse slipped from his lips. He knew all too well what Aodhan is capable of...  
Keaira opened the door on the stables, the mutilated elf passed her by, went inside and started to thoroughly check the horses. She was watching him closely all the time. The way he moved, the way he walked, his height and weight, she assessed his speed, strength and agility. This elf was really a very, very experienced, strong and dangerous opponent. If they don't get rid of him somehow, they're having a huge problem...  
After a while he turned to her and another sleazy smirk appeared on his face: „I see your father told the truth. What a shame, that I'm a bit in a hurry, sweetie..." he walked up very close to her and suddenly out of nowhere his right hand flew up to her breast and he squeezed it. She quickly stepped back and suppressed another instinctive reflex to grab his hand and break his wrist. She turned her face away and looked down to the ground so that he can not see the anger in her eyes.  
Aodhan smirked maliciously: „You never know, maybe I'll drop by some time again..." he snickered, went out of the stables and walked up to his horse.  
She watched him as he took the burning torch from the wall next to the front door and swinged up to his saddle with it. He circled around in front of the tavern watching the tracks on the ground. Then he slowly walked with his horse towards the forest, where Jarlath and the female elf headed to in the morning. He turned back a few times to check the tracks and walked up to the forest's edge. There he stopped for a while and illuminated the ground with the torch. He threw it away and spurred the horse into a gallop through the dark forest.  
Keaira tilted her head to her back and watched the stars in the night sky. She exhaled in relief, went over to get the torch from the ground, placed it back into the wall bracket next to the tavern's front door and went inside.

* * *

The guests left one after another during the late evening, the innkeeper closed the door and helped Keaira and Maired to clean up everything. Coinneach went down to the kitchen and prepared some food with the half-elf for all of them. Keaira silently turned and went upstairs to the guest room. When she returned, she was wearing again her own clean elven clothes with the washed green scarf tied to her upper arm and her hair tied with a hair ribbon into a knot at the back of her head.  
„Thank you Mairead." she returned back to the innkeeper's wife the crimson dress and the scarf she was wearing during the day.  
„My pleasure, sweetie." replied the friendly woman, but Keaira shivered slightly as she heard the last word. She saw Aodhan's mutilated face in her mind while hearing it. Tonight she wasn't in the best mood.  
When the half-elf and his wife said good night and went to their bedroom, Coinneach filled his and Keaira's cup with wine.  
„When Jarlath returns with our horses, we'll immediately leave." he told her and watched her. She drank up the whole cup at once and stretched out her hand to him to refill it again.  
„We're leaving?" she curiously looked at him.  
„The longer we stay here, the more dangerous it is for these people. I don't want them to pay a nasty price for their help if somebody like him comes back here..." he refilled her cup and noticed, that her hand is shaking a bit.  
„Who is that mutilated elf, Coinneach? He's dangerous as hell!" she asked again and stared at him.  
His face hardened and his lips were squeezed: „A long time ago he was a member of the Scoia'tael. We were in the same commando. When we've lost our leader, a huge quarrel started amongst a few of us. We had... different opinions on many matters." he took a swig of wine and continued with a sarcastic tone: „So we quickly settled it between us and he had to leave back then. Since that time he's working for humans out of pure hate and revenge and helps them to hunt down elves, especially the Scoia'tael."  
„I see... and how did you ‚settle it'?" she asked sarcastically as well.  
Coinneach smirked malevolently and pointed with a finger towards his left scarred ear: „I guess you've noticed the scar on his head..."  
She giggled shortly, then shook her head with a serious face again: „To help someone like Vascoigne, that's quite a change of mind for someone, who's been a member of the Scoia'tael. Wasn't there something more behind it?" she gave him a questioning look.  
His gaze hardened again: „There was, but that's none of your business, Keaira."  
She nodded and didn't ask further questions about the topic as she could see, that he won't tell her anything more about it.  
„Would you like to know anything else about what I've told you yesterday evening and today in the morning? Do you have any further questions?"  
„Not to what you've told me, but to what you haven't told me yet." he had a cold look in his eyes while saying it.  
„What do you mean, Coinneach?" she raised one eyebrow in surprise.  
„You said yesterday in the evening, that in Dillingen they've only picked me, Isengrim, Angus and Riordain. We already know from Jarlath what has happened to the rest. Iorveth is the only one who probably survived. What about the other three?!" he stared relentlessly right into her eyes.  
She gulped and slowly said: „They've brought all three of them into a shed not far away from the port. Angus and Riordain were stabbed and strangled to death... It looked horrible inside... Isengrim managed to escape, he probably lives and is hiding somewhere..." she watched as the corners of his mouth fell down for a second, but he quickly restrained himself.  
„I came too late, it was all over at that time... I couldn't help them anymore..." she hung her head, stood up and while walking away towards the stairs she quietly added: „I'm sorry, please forgive me..."  
He remained sitting there until he didn't drink up the whole wine. And then suddenly to his own surprise his stomach turned and he puked at length into the garbage bucket in the kitchen. It wasn't from the wine...

When he finally came upstairs into the guest room, Keaira was already enwrapped in the woolen blanket sitting with closed eyes in the rocking chair just like the night before. He knew, that she's not sleeping yet. He noticed, that the sheath with her knife is missing on the table. A possible reason crossed his mind, why she so quickly tied it back to her thigh.  
„Did he hurt you?" he asked carefully, when he laid down to the bed and leaned his head against the headboard so that he can see her.  
„That's none of your business, Coinneach." she replied to him with closed eyes in the same way as he did before downstairs in the kitchen.  
He was silently watching her for a while and then he spoke to her again: „I have a favor to ask."  
„A favor?" she opened one eye while speaking and looked at him.  
„Come with me to the Ravine of the Hydra. There I'll tell you how I decided. If I refuse, I'll make sure, that one of Deagan's people will accompany you and helps you find Iorveth and Isengrim. If I agree, then we'll need to get rid of Aodhan somehow..."  
She closed her eye and replied with a cold voice: „We'll see tomorrow, Coinneach. Good night."  
Coinneach blew out the candle on the bedside table and turned to the side: „Good night, Keaira."

* * *

When he woke up in the next morning, the rocking chair was already empty. Her belt with swords was also missing from the table. Instead a tray with breakfast was standing there. He noticed, that she has already eaten her portion. Coinneach stood up and walked over to the table. He heard a noise from the forest's edge behind the tavern, leaned forward and looked out through the window. Keaira was just finishing a set of exercises with two swords. After a few fast circular moves she threw both up into the air quickly one after another into different heights and distances and from two fast flips kicked them both away. Both swords rattled as they've hit two trees nearby and remained stuck in the tree trunks. He slowly finished his breakfast and watched her through the window in the meantime as she walked up to the trees to get her swords and hid them in her belt. Then she made a few more flips, jumps and somersaults and disappeared after a while behind the corner of the tavern. He took the tray and brought it to the kitchen.  
There he has met the half-elf's wife.  
„Thank you." he handed the tray over to her.  
„You're welcome." Mairead smiled.  
„When Jarlath returns in the evening with our horses, we leave. I'd like to ask you for some provisions for us." he returned the smile. „If it's not too much trouble for you."  
The innkeeper's wife nodded: „Of course it's not, I'll prepare and pack something for both of you."  
He thanked her with a short nod and went to see the half-elf. In the front door he almost bumped into Keaira who just came in.  
„Good morning." she greeted him and wanted to pass him by, but he stopped her with a gentle move of his hand.  
„So, are we leaving tonight?"  
She raised her head a looked up at him: „Are you sure, you're already strong enough? And are you sure, that you really want to go there?"  
„To ask something like this an elf, who already decided, is quite a waste of words..."  
She rolled her eyes: „Yes, I was missing yesterday already the whole day long exactly this elven hogwash..." she turned and left through the kitchen.  
He grinned and went outside.

* * *

They've spend the day by helping the half-elf and his wife. Coinneach was chopping wood and repaired the wooden fence behind the tavern, Keaira was preparing the food and washing up in the kitchen so that Mairead can take care of the guests. The innkeeper has shown Coinneach a place not far away from the tavern, where he could burn his old clothes and when the fire was burning, he threw the the sheet with all his old clothes into it. He sat down on the fence's wooden railing and watched the fire. It was after dusk already and the fire just started to swallow the black jackboots when Keaira came over to him. She silently sat down on the railing nearby as well. An old long forgotten memory suddenly flashed through her mind.  
„My dad once lit up a midsummer bonfire behind our house and said it's for my birthday..." she quietly whispered and then strongly twitched as if waking up from a bad dream.  
Coinneach looked at her in surprise: „You mean your real father?"  
„Yes..." she looked at him with fear in her eyes. It was for the first time he had seen her like this. „I... I just remembered that suddenly..."  
„You don't have to be scared of memories, Keaira." he turned his face towards the fire. „It's the future, that can hurt you..."  
They remained sitting there in silence until the fire slowly burned down.

From the forest on the opposite side a silent trampling of horse hooves sounded. They both noticed it at the same time and carefully watched the forest's edge. After a while Jarlath appeared with the slim female elf on their horses. Both horses had their hooves covered with pieces of cloth and the female elf was dragging behind her horse a large tree branch to cover their tracks. They both looked very tired.  
Jarlath walked up to them and jumped down from the horse. He handed over the reins to Keaira without saying a word. Coinneach went over to the blond elf and gave him a friendly hug. They both tapped on each others shoulders and then Coinneach gratefully nodded towards the female elf, who jumped down from the other horse. Keaira came close to her and stretched out her hand. The female elf shortly smiled at her and shook her hand. Then she spoke to Keaira with a smooth pleasant voice: „They asked me to tell you, that they thank you." and when she saw Keaira's surprised face, she added: „For him..." she nodded towards Coinneach „...and also for that... gift."  
And without saying anything more she turned away, waived shortly to Jarlath and disappeared between the houses.  
Keaira turned her face to Jarlath with a questioning look.  
„I had to tell them, otherwise they wouldn't accept it." he waived his hands apologetically and smiled at her.  
Coinneach was watching them both silently. She shook her head in disbelief, but smiled as well. When Jarlath turned back to Coinneach and they started to talk quietly, she went around the corner to the front side of the tavern. The half-elf just came out through the front door, she could hear the guests' loud conversations and laughter.  
„I've already prepared and stored everything for you in the stables. Mairead doesn't want to bid you farewell..." he wiggled a bit nervously. „She says it brings bad luck..." and smiled ashamed.  
Keaira smiled as well, then she walked up to him and gave him a hug. „Thank you. I won't forget you."  
The half-elf returned the hug shyly and helped her to carry everything from the stables to the back side of the tavern.

They stowed the provisions into their saddles' pockets, Coinneach tied the sheath with his knife to his thigh and buckled on the belt with his two new elven swords. He threw over his head the bow sheath to his back and tied the quiver onto the right side of the palomino's saddle. He shook hands with the half-elf and Jarlath, fastened up his armor jacket and swinged up to his saddle. Keaira waived to the innkeeper and shook Jarlath's outstretched hand.  
„Don't spur the horses too much, we had almost no rest at all." the blond elf told her.  
She nodded, fastened up her jacket and also swinged up to her horse's saddle. They left the horses' hooves covered with the cloth pieces for now and slowly walked over to the forest. Keaira turned in her saddle and looked back before they disappeared between the trees. The half-elf and Jarlath were thoroughly covering their tracks around the tavern. Coinneach spurred the palomino into a trot and she followed.

* * *

At dawn they've found a small rocky ledge and they hid underneath it. They unsaddled the horses and removed the cloth pieces from their hooves. With the saddles under their heads and enwrapped in their cloaks they've slept for a few hours. Keaira woke up through a gentle tap on her shoulder. Coinneach was standing bended over her: „We should go. Deagan will slow Aodhan down, but he surely won't stop him. He'll find the trail again..."  
She nodded, stretched her arms and legs and they've quickly eaten a bit from what Mairead has packed for them. After a while they've continued their journey. They came to a crossroad. To the left the road was leading towards the Ravine of the Hydra, to the right towards the lowlands at the Pontar river. Coinneach turned left and she followed in a trot.  
„So, do you have a name for him finally? He should have a name if you want to keep him..." Keaira asked while looking at the palomino.  
Coinneach looked at her, then down at the palomino and answered with a grin: "Evall."  
"Very creative..." she made an ironical remark also with a grin.  
The word 'evall' meant 'horse' in Elder Speech.

At noon they went through a mountain pass and started to ascend on a rocky road towards the ravine.  
Lanaer suddenly stopped in the middle of the road and turned around.  
"Wait." Keaira said to Coinneach. He stopped the palomino, turned in his saddle and watched her and her horse. The horse wiggled with his ears and left them in a forward position. Then he raised one hoof. Keaira was silently watching the hoof underneath her. The horse slowly moved the hoof backwards and took a small step back.  
"Somebody is following us." Keaira said quietly and focused her sight on the mountain pass through which they just came.  
Coinneach turned the palomino around and walked up to her so that he was standing right next to her. He pulled out the bow from the sheath on his back and took an arrow from the quiver. He prepared both for a shot, but hasn't drawn the bow yet. It was very silent around them and they could easily hear the faint sound of trampling horse hooves. Coinneach drew the bow and aimed high up to the distance towards the exit of the mountain pass. They were both listening for a while. A moment later he slowly relaxed his hand and loudly whistled. The same whistle returned as an answer from the mountain pass.  
"Multiple riders. Aodhan would be alone." he explained when he turned his face to Keaira.  
Three riders emerged from the mountain pass' exit. She noticed their elven clothes and equipment from afar. Scoia'tael. The group was led by a blackhaired elf on a beautiful black horse. Behind him was another darkhaired elf and on the third one a blond elf with mid-length hair, both on brown horses. Keaira recognized the blackhaired elf as the one whom she saw leaving the tavern in the night, when they've arrived there.

A large smile appeared on Coinneach's face when he saw them. He inserted his bow back into the sheath on his back, pushed the arrow back into the quiver and jumped down from his palomino. The three elves trotted towards them and the blackhaired elf jumped down from his horse even before it stopped. He quickly rushed to Coinneach and they firmly hugged each other. The happiness about their meeting could be openly seen on both their faces.  
"Deagan!" said Coinneach, then he nodded towards the other two elves with a smile. "Niall, Eirnin."  
They nodded back and all three elves turned their heads towards Keaira. All three had the typically beautiful symmetric elven faces. The blackhaired elf had golden colored eyes, the other two blue colored. She guessed, that they were all about the same height as Coinneach and also well-built as him.  
"I suppose you're the reason why Neach is still alive." spoke the blackhaired elf to her and looked her over from head to toe.  
She slightly nodded: "Keaira."  
She was still sitting on her horse and looked down at him. She wasn't sure what to expect from them. They were Scoia'tael and hated nothing more than humans like her.  
He walked up to her and slowly stretched out his hand with a slight smile. She returned the smile and jumped down from her horse. Now he was looking down at her when they shook hands. The other two elves also jumped down from their horses and shook hands with her.  
They introduced themselves one after another. She was a bit relieved.  
Deagan turned to Coinneach: "We perfectly disoriented Aodhan. We parted ways into different directions on eleven horses, three of those had female riders. It'll take a while until he gets out of that mess."  
Coinneach nodded with a smirk: "I was already afraid, that you'll attack him instead."  
"I'm not scared, but I'm also not mad, Neach." Deagan returned the smirk.  
"How did you know where to find me?"  
"Jarlath..."  
Coinneach nodded again, swinged back up to his saddle and waived with his hand to Keaira. When they were all back in their saddles, they continued to follow the rocky road towards the ravine together. Deagan and Coinneach were at the front side by side, behind them Keaira and next to her Eirnin, the blond elf. At the back Niall was closing the group. Coinneach and Deagan were quietly talking the whole time. Keaira was silent, but she noticed, that Eirnin is watching her from the corner of his eye.  
"You didn't have to send us that diamond." said after a while the blond elf.  
"Don't look a gift horse in the mouth." Keaira reacted quickly.  
"Why did you help him? You're a human... And you know, who he is..." this time he looked unpleasantly straight at her.  
"I'm not from here and I'm not very fond of my origins... You elves have a strange tendency to constantly remind me of it... I've already told him why I've helped him. Exactly because he is who he is." she nodded with her head towards Coinneach and stared at the blond elf unyieldingly.  
Eirnin looked back at Niall. They exchanged a brief telling look and Eirnin turned back to Keaira with distrust in his face: "Don't know how it's there where you're coming from, but here the elves don't like the humans and the humans don't like the elves even more... We can hardly speak about mutual trust or even saving each others lives... It's quite the opposite in fact..."  
Keaira angrily looked at the blond elf: "I'm not forcing anyone to trust me and I don't need to buy anybody's favor either. I can take care of myself. Maybe you should bite your tongue, you talk too much for an elf..."  
She could hear a muffled laugh behind her back and the offended blond elf turned away his head to the other side.  
Deagan and Coinneach were silently grinning.  
"She has a sharp tongue..."  
"She grew up amongst elves..."  
They both smiled.

* * *

The rocky road led them to a vast plateau. About 300 feet ahead of them was the edge of the ravine. The horses slowed down to a walk and everyone was carefully looking around. Keaira noticed many splashes and pools of blood covering the whole plateau. Too many. Deagan's and Coinneach's horses reached the edge of the plateau and stopped.  
She saw how Coinneach looked down and then immediately raised his head and took a deep loud breath. She passed by Deagan's horse and stopped next to him. On her other side was Eirnin and alongside him Niall. She bended slightly forward in her saddle and looked down. What she saw took also her breath away...

Dozens of elven dead bodies were lying upon each other at the bottom of the ravine twisted in unnatural poses. All of them were wearing the black officer uniforms of the Vrihedd brigade. On the ledges along the ravine's wall were many bloodstains. She could see on some dead corpses lying on top with tilted heads their slit throats, others had deep open wounds on their chests and stomachs, a few had no hands or legs...

She moved with her horse backwards away from the four elves standing at the ravine's edge, turned her horse around and looked into the distance. A thousand thoughts rushed through her head, but she couldn't concentrate on none of them. Eirnin and Niall turned their horses around after a while as well and went further away to the side. They were both silently looking down to the ground. Deagan was watching Coinneach for some time, then he turned his horse around without saying a word and walked up to her.  
"We'll wait for you at the mountain pass." his gaze was chillingly cold and the spoke to her with clenched teeth.  
She quietly nodded.  
Deagan waived at Eirnin and Niall and they left in a trot back towards the rocky road which led them here.

Keaira turned her face to Coinneach. He was sitting on his horse with his back to her, his head hanged down looking for a very long time at the ravine's bottom. Then he slowly turned his head to the side and she noticed the fallen corners of his mouth, the tightly squeezed eyes and the slight shaking of his shoulders. And then she realized, that this tough battle-hardened elf is crying...

She silently turned her horse around and slowly walked away towards the rocky road. When she reached the entrance of the mountain pass, she walked up to the three elves waiting there. Nobody said a word. Eirnin and Niall looked to the side, only Deagan looked at her as she came closer.  
"I think he needs to be alone for a while." she whispered and swallowed the knot forming in her throat.  
Deagan was intently staring at her and then he silently nodded with gratitude in his eyes.

* * *

They were waiting there for over two hours. Then they heard a horse slowly descending on the rocky road. Keaira turned in her saddle and watched Coinneach approaching. He was sitting in the saddle with his back stretched, on his face an obscure expressionless mask showing no emotions. But she noticed his reddened eyes and turned her head away. He passed them by without saying a single word and continued towards the mountain pass. The silent group proceeded back towards the crossroad.

As they've arrived at the crossroad, Coinneach stopped and turned his horse towards her. She walked up to him and stopped in the opposite direction so close to him that their knees in the saddles almost touched each other. Deagan, Eirnin and Niall passed them by and waited a bit further away.  
He was silently looking into her eyes for a long time. Then he took a breath and told her with a determined voice:  
"I think, that I have now no more reasons why I would like to come back here again. It's time to find Iorveth and Isengrim. You have my word, that I'll do everything to convince them, that there's no future for us elves here anymore."


	6. Chapter 6

From that moment on the crossroad they were all five traveling together. They were going to Brokilon and had a long journey ahead of them. Now they were approaching Tretogor, the capital city of Redania. From there it was another three hundred miles to Oxenfurt, where they wanted to cross the Pontar river. Then around Gors Velen to the borders of the Brokilon forest.  
They were already for more than a week on their way through forests and swamps avoiding the cities and bigger villages. And for the whole time Coinneach didn't speak a word to her. He was mostly talking to Deagan, Keaira and Niall were following them and Eirnin kept a larger distance from the group and was watching out, if they're not being followed by someone. He was still upset about her brazenness.  
She had a few interesting discussions with Niall on the way – she tried to amend her knowledge about this world and about some parts of the past of these elves and the Scoia'tael. Niall was at the beginning surprised by the extent of the information she already had and a bit reserved. But then he saw her genuine interest and started to talk openly to her. In the end he was himself asking many questions about things they on the contrary didn't know. It was natural for her and she understood. It was a medieval world, where information and news were traveling only slowly and she was a great source of knowledge about the history and geopolitical development of this world, which she has gained during her studies and later at the Academy.  
She noticed, that during these discussions with Niall, Deagan and Coinneach mostly remained silent and she knew that they're listening.

When they came out of the forest again, they could see the northern outskirts of Tretogor in front of them. Coinneach and Deagan at the front stopped.  
„We should circle around the city from the east, there's more cover and we don't have to go such a long way round as from the west." Deagan said.  
„All right guys, then I'll meet you near Oxenfurt." Keaira smirked, passed them two by and started to walk slowly directly towards the city's outskirts.  
„Keaira?!"  
She turned in her saddle. Coinneach was staring at her, one eyebrow raised and he was shaking his head in disagreement. Except a small wound on the upper part of his nose, all the bruises, wounds and the swelling have already disappeared.  
„We need some money and I can't exchange the gemstones for it in a forest..." she replied with a sarcastic undertone.  
„I'm not sure if that's a good idea, if you'll go there alone like this..." said now Niall and pointed with his hand to her elven clothes.  
She looked down at herself, then again back at them and had an even bigger grin on her face now as the one before: „I think, that the clothes are the least of my problems. In fact it doesn't really matter, what I'm wearing. I just need to open my mouth and I'm already in trouble..." she winked, turned back to the city and before spurring her horse into a fast trot she loudly added: „And I'm for sure not taking one of you with me – I'm not in the mood to watch your feet wave in the wind, when they hang you on the first tree they'll find..."  
Deagan was also grinning now, Niall just shook his head in disbelief. They both spurred their horses and went to the east towards the next forest. Coinneach was standing there for a long time and watched her leave with a sullen face. Then he also spurred his horse and followed Niall and Deagan.

* * *

Keaira threw the cloak over her shoulders and at least partially covered her elven clothing. Niall was right, but she had no choice. They'll have to abundantly bribe a lot of people near Oxenfurt to get safely to the other side of the bridge over the Pontar river to Temeria. It won't be that easy with four elves...  
She walked amongst the first houses on the outskirts. The people standing around were scowling at her. She didn't care. She carefully pulled out of one of the saddle's pockets a small thin bundle of maps and quickly looked through them. She found the map of Tretogor, raised her sight and searched the nearest church towering up between the houses. A moment later she spotted another church further away. She slightly turned the map, looked around, quickly stowed the bundle back into the pocket and walked to the left still sitting on her horse. Keaira left the hood of her cloak purposely down on her neck, so that it's clearly visible, that she's a human and the town guards, who were literally everywhere, don't stop her unnecessarily. She tried to keep her horse as calm as possible and walked very slowly while trying not to look directly into the guards' eyes.

She crossed the outskirts and walked up to the smallest northern city gate. Without hesitation and with her most beautiful smile she came close to the armed guards standing next to the gate.  
„Stop, woman! Who are you and what do you want here?" asked one of the guards and pointed with a crossbow at her.  
She stopped her horse, but didn't stop smiling and said with a kind voice: „A messenger. I'm having a message for Jasper Vivaldi from Vimme Vivaldi from Novigrad."  
The guards snickered: „I have never seen such a messenger like you before." Then he snarled at her still pointing with his crossbow at her: „So tell me, messenger of the Vivaldi's, how's young Vimme doing? Business is good?"  
Keaira smirked: „I'm not sure how good you know Vimme, but he's definitely not young – his beard and hair are a bit too grey for that. And if I omit his fat belly, which is getting bigger each year, then thanks for asking. He's in good health even in his old age and the business is going quite well. Otherwise he'd probably not have this personal calculator made of golden wires with rubies, emeralds, onyxes and agates..."  
The guards' jaws have visibly dropped and the one holding the crossbow has also lowered his hands.  
„All right, I have probably misjudged you..." mumbled the guard and added: „But I won't let you enter the city with weapons anyway."  
Keaira calmly unbuckled her cloak and revealed her clothes.  
The guard's crossbow was quickly pointing at her again. „Are you kidding me, woman?! I hope you didn't think, that I'll let you inside the city with these clothes on and moreover to see Vivaldi in them?!" shouted the guard angrily.  
She kept her temper: „I have a very urgent message, which I was supposed to convey here on the shortest possible path. That means to go straight through the woods, not the long way round using the usual trade routes. I hope you don't think, that I'd enter the woods full of those disgusting elves in normal clothes?! Then I could as well paint a target on my back!" she reacted indignantly. „A dead messenger is a bad messenger! And I have the order to convey the message as soon as possible, whatever it takes! I had no time yet to change my clothes. I can assure you, that I'll gladly do that right away after delivering the message."  
The second guard whispered something into the ear of the first one.  
„All right, all right..." said the first guard again. „Go then, I can see, that you carry no weapons. But if you make any trouble in the city, then you'll end up in jail. Is that clear?!"  
Keaira only silently nodded. She hid her belt with swords and her knife already long before in one of the saddle's pockets. She was relieved, that the guards were asking no further questions and didn't wanted to see the seal of the Vivaldi's, about which she knew, that their messengers are always carrying with them. To say, that she's lost it somewhere on the way, would have been a poor excuse.

She noticed an inconspicuously looking man standing near the gate, who was watching the whole scene. It was clear for her at first glance, that this is someone from the redanian secret service. _Dijkstra's man..._ flashed through her mind. Considering her look and the ruckus she has raised at the city's gate, she wasn't surprised, when the inconspicuously looking man quietly started to follow her through the city's streets. She wanted to avoid the secret service, especially the redanian one, as much as possible. Aside from Nilfgaard it was the Redanian's who had amongst the Nordlings the best and most feared secret service. And she had absolutely no desire to meet Dijkstra himself, the head of the Redanian Intelligence. She would most probably not survive a meeting with him.  
At that time she couldn't know, that in a few months she'll be looking for him...

* * *

They heard a familiar whistle in the distance behind their backs. All three of them stopped and waited, while Deagan whistled back. Shortly after Eirnin appeared between the trees. He was rushing in a fierce gallop towards them.  
„Where is she?!" was his first question before anyone of them could ask him anything.  
„In the city, she wanted to get some money..." answered Deagan, but he became visibly nervous.  
„Are you mad?! We have Aodhan on our trail!" shouted Eirnin outraged.  
Coinneach twitched slightly, but immediately reacted: „Aodhan is looking for me in the first place and maybe some female elf. He doesn't know, what she looks like, neither does he know, that she's a human and not an elf."  
Eirnin calmed down a bit, but then also quickly answered: „I've seen, where you parted ways – what do you think, whom will he chase first?! Four elves or a single woman?!"  
„Fuck!" sizzled Deagan, then looked at Coinneach and waited.  
Niall was cursing aloud: „Shit, we didn't think about that!"  
„She claimed, that she can take care of herself, so forget about her and let's go! And fast!" said Eirnin again and almost spurred his horse already, but the other three elves were standing there still and looking at each other undecided.  
He looked at them in surprise: „You've got to be kidding me! What are you even thinking about? I'll surely not risk my life by entering the lion's den only to help some pathetic Dh'oine!" Eirnin was yelling at them angrilly, but all three quickly snarled back at him.  
„If you wouldn't be acting like a sulky child already for over a week, you'd realize, that she's quite a smart woman!" said Niall.  
Then Deagan added: „Don't forget, that she saved Neach's life..."  
Coinneach just looked at Eirnin mercilessly: „And I'd be glad, if you wouldn't call her Dh'oine anymore!"  
Eirnin was staring in disbelief at all the three Scoia'tael in front of him for a while and said scornfully shortly after: „Did she fuck the brain out of all three of you in the meantime, that you're all suddenly having the hots for her?!"  
Within a second Coinneach's hand flew forward and grabbed Eirnin's arm almost dragging him down from his horse as he pulled him with a jerk towards himself: „Say something like this once again and Aodhan will be the least of your problems! Understood?!" Coinneach was literally barking at him and boiling with rage...  
Eirnin's face turned slightly pale, but he quickly restrained himself: „Who would have thought, Neach! Since when are you so touchy to human women? If I remember correctly, then the last one that came across our way, back then during wartime, was begging us after three hours to rather finally cut her throat...!" sizzled Eirnin back at him.  
Coinneach's left fist has hit in that moment Eirnin's jaw from the side with such a blow, that if he wouldn't be holding him with his right hand, the blond elf would've fallen from his horse.  
„Enough!" shouted Deagan. „That wasn't the first nor the last bullshit we did – and you were as always amongst the first, Eirnin!"  
Both elves were furiously glaring at each other, but Coinneach released Eirnin's arm and Eirnin was spitting blood to the ground.  
Deagan continued angrily: „I don't care if you beat the shit out of each other later, but for now we have Aodhan on our trail and she's in a city, which no elf with at least a bit of common sense would voluntarily enter! Neach, we can't help her right now! If she's really that good as you say, then she can take care of herself! We cannot attack Aodhan here, you know it yourself! Let's go!"  
Coinneach was looking at him for a while undecided, his lips were still squeezed in anger. Then he nodded and all four disappeared in a gallop between the trees.

* * *

Keiara slowly walked up to the splendid house in a rich quarter of the town, which was surrounded by heavily armed guards. She jumped down from her horse, turned with a brazen smile to the inconspicuous man from the redanian secret service and nodded with her head. He angrily turned his head away and looked to the side. She used this moment to quickly reach out into one of her saddle's pockets and pulled out something. Not even the guard standing closest to her could manage to see what it was.  
She came close to him: „I have a message from Vimme Vivaldi. For Jasper only. It's very urgent." and waved with a middle-sized cotton pouch in her hand in front of herself so that the agent behind her back doesn't see it. The guard immediately understood, nodded with his head and escorted her inside the house.

He told her to sit down in a richely decorated hall and disappeared in the house interior. Shortly after an older bearded dwarf wearing an expensive suit was walking towards her. He looked her over from head to toe and then waved with his hand for her to follow him. They entered a smaller side room, where a gnome was bended over a table busily writing something into a thick book.  
„Ehm..." Jasper Vivaldi coughed aloud. The young gnome twitched slightly, but stood up immediately and left the room with a curtsy. Jasper Vivaldi closed the door behind him and turned to Keaira.  
„It doesn't happen every day, that a human woman in elven clothes with an agent on her heels and a pouch full of gemstones comes to my house as a customer – according to my guard's information..." he was again eyeballing her.  
„I know the Vivaldi's don't like humans that much, especially if they mean trouble. So I'm not going to prolong it unnecessarily..." said Keaira, walked up to the table and laid the cotton pouch onto it. Jasper Vivaldi looked at her from the corner of his eye while he came close to the table and untied the lace on top of the pouch. A handful of gemstones glistened on the table. His experienced eye quickly counted almost twenty of them. He looked at her in surprise.  
„And what would my unusual customer like to have for these in exchange?" he said in a sudden gentle tone.  
One corner of Keaira's mouth twitched with the hint of a smile: „All the common currencies - crowns, ducats, florens, nobles, orens and thalers. It doesn't have to be that much of the latter one's..."  
Vivaldi had open surprise on his face: „Is the lady planning to go on a longer trip?"  
„Let's say I do and let's say I don't know yet where my journey will take me. I'd like to be prepared for all the possibilities..." she had a broad smile on her face. „Of course, if you would manage to obtain everything until today's late evening in the necessary quantity, then I'll gladly add an extra to your usual provision..."  
„Ehm..." Vivaldi cleared his throat again and scratched his head in uncertainty. „I'll try. But I'd advice the lady not to come back here in the night again with an agent on her heels and not through the front door..." he looked at her.  
„Thank you. I was hoping for your renowned discretion and I'll gladly take your advice. So what should my nightly arrival here look like?" She hasn't stop smiling...

* * *

Aodhan furiously spitted into the smoldering embers, which he has just found in the forest. Then he swinged up to his horse and rushed in a fierce gallop through the forest following the tracks of five riders. He was raging for over a week already because of how the Scoia'tael tricked him with those eleven horses. He's lost two full days just by looking for the right tracks. Finally he's found Deagan's and two others and those have led him to the tracks of Coinneach and the female elf. He was chasing them without a break at such pace, that in one village he had to change horses as his was already wheezing from exhaustion. With a new rested horse he almost catched up with them just before Tretogor.

He came out of the forest and stopped. Four tracks were leading to the side towards a forest in the east. One was leading straight towards the city. He immediately realized, that it's the one of the female elf.  
And in that moment the first doubts emerged in his mind. What if she's not an elf at all?! No elf would go straight to Tretogor – even less a lonely female elf... Some things now suddenly started to make sense, others have lost it completely. If it's a human woman, then he now understood, how she could come so close in a calm trot to the redanian escort on the road to Drakenborg to be able to attack them. But why the hell would any human save an officer of the Vrihedd brigade and help the Scoia'tael?! All the more a woman?! This made no sense at all.  
He hesitated for a moment... His target is Coinneach, but if he could catch her alone and squeeze her for information, she could tell him, where they're heading to and he would have a chance to pass ahead of them and wait for them somewhere on a suitable place... He knew, that they have to go round through the woods and off the usual tracks and main roads. He would be at an advantage, he knows a lot of people in Tretogor, somebody must have seen her...  
A malicious smirk appeared on his face, he turned the horse towards the city and spurred him into a gallop again.

* * *

Keaira came out of the bank and looked around. The inconspicuously looking man from the redanian secret service was not there anymore. But she noticed two other men on the other side of the street, who were suspiciously long loitering around a house. She sighed – somehow she'll need to get rid of them until the evening and don't cause any trouble for herself. She swinged up to Lanaer's saddle and slowly returned to the small city gate, through which she came here. The guards were just changing. The two new ones were staring at her surprised, while the other two leaving the gate nodded towards her. She nodded back with a forced smile and turned behind the gate towards the nonhuman district. One of the agents following her stayed at the gate, while the other one continued to follow her.

She stopped in front of a large tavern called ‚The Bearded Axe', where Vivaldi has sent her to and grinned in her mind. _I bet, that the innkeeper is a dwarf and that an axe will be hanging on a wall somewhere inside the tavern... _And so it was – when she entered, all of the guests in the tavern remained silent for a while. Almost all of them were dwarves, then three elves, one human male and one halfling. Not a single woman. She nodded to all of them to greet them and sat down at a small table in the corner, that was free. She was already again wearing her belt with swords and her knife on her thigh. All the guests just quickly looked at her and then stopped taking notice of her. Except the three elves. She saw, that they're watching her from the corners of their eyes.  
Keaira pulled off her jacket and loosened the lace on the neckline of her blouse. She noticed on the opposite wall above the fireplace an axe pinned to the wall and a sturdy darkhaired dwarf in an apron was approaching her. She smiled...

The innkeeper looked her over from head to toe and carefully studied her elven clothes. Then his sight remained on the knife strapped to her thigh and his eyebrows wrinkled.  
„If there's a chance to avoid it, you won't have any trouble with me." she silently spoke to him and clattered with a few coppers in her hand, which she's taken as an advance from Vivaldi. Afterwards she casually pulled out from the front pocket on her belt a few crowns as well. The dwarf's eyes glistened.  
„But if there should be any trouble..." she continued quietly „...then I'll make up for it."  
A large smile appeared on the innkeeper's face, but disappeared right away, when she added: „I'll have something to eat and some wine. But I need to get rid of the agent standing now outside your front door and another one at the small northern city gate..."  
The dwarf wiggled a bit nervously...  
„I'll pay for that of course as well..." Keaira said and the dwarf inconspicuously took the offered crowns from her palm. He nodded and went back into the kitchen.  
One of the three elves sitting at the table nearby was now looking at her with open interest. He had on his lips and chin a nasty old scar from a sword or a knife, but it has not affected his elven charm. He had light brown hair and eyes of almost the same color. A very nice face and figure. She slightly smiled at him and noticed for a second the hint of a smile on his face as well.  
The innkeeper brought her after a while a big portion of scrambled eggs with a piece of bread. She nodded thankfully. When he returned the second time from the kitchen, he's brought a small jug with wine and a cup.  
„When do you need to get rid of those two agents?" he asked her whispering.  
„Very late in the evening. Right before I leave." she whispered back.  
„Where do you need to go then?" asked the dwarf quickly again.  
„To Vivaldi. That means two houses away from Vivaldi..." she winked at him. The innkeeper understood, nodded and left for the kitchen again. Shortly after she could see how the dwarf is leaving the tavern through a back door next to the kitchen.

The browneyed elf was silently watching her quiet talk with the innkeeper and then how the dwarf left. He raised an eyebrow in surprise and looked at her. She stared at him for a while, then waved with her hand towards the empty chair at her table. The elf said quickly something to the other two sitting with him at the table, stood up, took his cup and walked over to her. The other two elves only shortly looked at her and returned back to their conversation.  
„You need some help, sister?" he smiled at her as he sat down on the opposite chair. He had a very pleasant voice and was swallowing her with his eyes. Her pussy tingled. _I really need to get laid... _flashed through her mind as she was watching him.  
She returned the smile: „Yes, but I think the innkeeper will manage..." and refilled his cup with wine from her jug. „And although I'm flattered, please don't call me ‚sister'. It evokes thoughts of incest in my mind..." she smirked at him while saying that.  
The browneyed elf just wanted to take a sip from his wine, but the cup in his hand stopped in that moment in front of his lips and hearing her last remark he had a lecherous smile on his face: „In that case – my name is Lorcan."  
„Keaira." she raised her cup and took a swig of wine.  
„If it's not too indiscreet - I'd like to know, what's a cute girl like you doing here alone – in such an unusual place and in such unusual clothes... A bit dangerous, isn't it?" he spoke to her quietly while she was eating.  
„Did you all eat already something?" she asked instead of answering.  
„Yes." he smiled.  
„Then have some more wine, I'll pay..." she returned the smile.  
Lorcan's sight remained on her lips. Without saying a word he raised his hand, held it up for a while and when he heard behind his back the footsteps of the innkeeper's aide coming towards them from the kitchen, he laid his hand back onto the table. She noticed further deep old scars on his uncovered forearm.  
„Or were you already leaving...?" she asked.  
„We're not in a hurry... The guys will surely enjoy a longer stay with a jug of good wine... And you?"  
„I have a few hours time – I don't need to leave before late evening..."  
The innkeeper's aide just arrived at their table.  
„Bring me two big jugs of wine, one for this table and one for my friends over there." Lorcan looked at the aide, then suddenly stopped him with his hand as he was about to leave, turned his face to Keaira and looked into her eyes:  
„And what are you planning to do until late evening?" he asked her outright and raised one corner of his mouth to a smile. His eyes were literally burning...  
„How would you like to call it? Chill out? Relax?" she squinted her eyes and also raised one corner of her mouth. Lorcan winked at her and turned back to the aide: „Bring our jug upstairs into one of the guest rooms."  
Then he pulled out from his pocket a pouch with coins and paid for everything right away. She noticed, that he paid for her food as well...  
„Thanks, but you didn't have to..."  
„My pleasure. I like you."  
„Are you always so fast?"  
„Rarely. But there are certain opportunities, which an elf should not miss." Again this smile with one raised corner of his mouth.  
„I'm surprised by your interest in human women. The elves are usually not very fond of them..."  
„In that case think of me as an exception. If I've assessed you right, then you're not exactly a typical human woman anyway..."  
„The clothes can lie..."  
„But not this..." he said quietly, stretched out his arm over the table and touched with his fingertips the upper part of her elven tattoo in her cleavage. Only now she realized, that she partially uncovered it, when she loosened the lace on the neckline of her blouse. Before he pulled his hand away, he went shamelessly with his fingers over her throat up to her lips and smiled again.  
She smiled as well and continued eating while they were talking.  
„That's why you've offered me your help?"  
„Maybe..." another lecherous smile. „You still haven't told me, what kind of trouble you're in. And you have some, considering how the innkeeper left, when you've finished talking..."  
„Let's say, that I need to get somewhere in Tretogor unnoticed and I wouldn't like to answer unpleasant questions from Dijkstra's men while getting there..."  
„I see... And how do you want to leave unnoticed from where you're going to? His agents are almost everywhere. Somebody will be on your heels again in no time."  
„I guess you have some experience with that."  
„Three elves sitting in a tavern in Tretogor with pockets full of money..." he grinned „I think that speaks for itself..."  
„Hm, and if I assessed you right, then you're not from here as well..." she grinned at him. „How do you plan to get away from here unnoticed?"  
„Maybe the same way as you... Just merely out of curiosity – why do you think, that we're not from here?"  
„I recognize the slight accent you have, I just can't place it..." She was unsuccessfully trying to figure it out already the whole time.  
And then she suddenly realized it in that moment as he spoke again.

„What's new on Gwaeloth?" he winked at her and switched from Elder Speech into muiren llinge - the language of the Aen Muire elves.  
Now she slowly stretched out her hand over the table, unbuttoned the decorated buckle on his shirt and pushed it aside. The edge of the same tattoo as she had appeared above his right pec muscle...  
Her face quickly turned from surprised to amused and then to angry.  
„I see... I'd like to know what you're doing here." she furrowed her brows while she also switched into muiren llinge.  
His face was serious now: „Until you came into the tavern I thought, that I'm the only one here. I'm already for almost two years here."  
„Two years?!" she interrupted him with an open surprise on her face.  
„Yes, originally I was send here to find and kill somebody. He fled and was hiding here. One of the most wanted elves within the Federation. He probably thought, that he's safe here on this medieval world and that the Federation will not dare to send someone here, because it is forbidden..." he ironically smiled at her during his last words.  
„I'm only here for over a week. I have the insane order to convince some Scoia'tael to leave this world with me. Allegedly they are essential for the Federation..." she had irony in her voice as well.  
„They've send you... to look for Scoia'tael..." he tilted his head to his back and laughed aloud. Then he threw a hard sarcastic look at her: „I'd kick the governor's asses..."  
„I'm not really fond of it myself..." she replied and quickly explained to him the current situation within the Union from the past few months.  
When she finished, he nodded: „That would explain, why when I've fulfilled my task, they've asked me to stay here and join the Scoia'tael. I had to send regular reports about the situation here and about certain elves..." he slightly smiled again.  
„Well, nobody told me on the other hand, that we have someone else here. And for such a long time already..."  
„I don't think, that the governors would like to publish that much, how often and in what extent they're breaking their own rules." He winked.  
Her anger subsided. She laughed: „They probably didn't expect, that we both meet at the same time in the same place – in a tavern right in Tretogor. And that we recognize each other..."  
He snickered: „You have to admit, that the chances are really unbelievably slim..."  
„You're right about that..." They were grinning at each other.  
„So, what's your problem? I'll gladly help."  
„I need to exchange the gemstones they gave me for money. I had no time to do so yet. I've asked the innkeeper to get rid of the two agents, which are on my heels since I've left Vivaldi's bank. I have to go back there during the night and I'd like not to be bothered by them while doing so."  
„Hm, that's why you're here – Vivaldi told you to go to this tavern." he winked at her again and she smiled.

Just as she finished her meal the innkeeper's aide came to their table and slightly coughed with a silly smile.  
Lorcan raised one eyebrow with a questioning look: „Would you still like to relax for a few hours?"  
„I'm literally yearning for a good relax already for weeks..." she licked her lips while replying.  
He squinted his eyes and again raised one corner of his mouth into a smile: „I'll tell the other two to make an arrangement with the innkeeper, when he comes back. We'll go to Vivaldi together and we'll lead you out of the city safely..."  
She nodded. They both stood up and while she has taken her jacket and followed the innkeeper's aide, Lorcan went over to the table, where the other two elves were sitting. He quietly talked to them. She noticed how one of them looked in surprise at her as she was leaving, when Lorcan was talking to him.

* * *

The four elves went around Tretogor through the woods and continued their journey to the southwest towards Oxenfurt. Coinneach stopped for a while, turned his horse around and was looking at the city's silhouette behind them.  
„Neach..." Deagan spoke silently to him.  
„I know..." replied Coinneach quietly as well. „But without her we won't get there so easily."  
„You don't have a choice anyway, you have to get out of Redania. We'll wait for her near Oxenfurt, if she doesn't come, then we'll have to try to reach Brokilon on our own. There we can think about what to do next..."  
Coinneach turned his face to him and had a strange look in his eyes: „I don't want to think about what's next, I'm done with this world, Deag..."  
Deagan was staring at him in surprise. Niall and Eirnin were standing a bit further away, the same huge surprise could be seen on their faces as well.  
A big bruise started to build on Eirnin's jaw, he was still spitting blood.  
Coinneach looked them all over from head to toe and then told them everything with almost a single breath. When he finished, Deagan was silently watching him for a long time.  
„Do you trust her, Neach?"  
„You know very well, that I immediately see it, if somebody lies to me. Even if it's a very good liar. She wasn't lying."  
„Are you absolutely sure? Have you decided for good?"  
Instead of answering Coinneach gave him an angry stare.  
Deagan only nodded, turned his horse and added: „We'll wait for her near Oxenfurt as long as necessary."  
All four of them spurred their horses into a gallop again. The dusk began to fall.

* * *

Aodhan entered the city's outskirts while following the woman's trail. He walked up to the first agent he saw without any hesitation and pulled out from a pocket on his jacket a small badge. The redanian crowned silver eagle and the emblem of Drakenborg shimmered on it. He came to the agent, waved with the badge in front of his eyes and snarled: „Vascoigne sends me. I need to speak to your boss immediately."  
The agent looked at the badge, then looked the mutilated elf over from head to toe with disgust and nodded: „Come with me."

* * *

As Keaira entered the furthermost guest room, which the innkeeper's aide has shown her, she could hear Lorcan running up the stairs. She left the door opened, walked over to the large high table, where a wine jug was standing and filled the two prepared cups with wine. She threw her jacket casually over a chair next to the table.  
The door behind her closed and Lorcan has placed the door bar on the door's hooks. She turned around.

He took off his shirt without saying a word, threw it onto the ground and walked up to her. She noticed, that the tattoo on his muscular chest is damaged on a few places through scars. Some of them were from bullet wounds. Just like some of hers.  
He grabbed her blouse, pulled it out of her pants with a jerk and pulled it over her head. While she unbuttoned her belt with swords and threw it over the chair, he untied the knot at the back of her head and let her curly hair down. They were both staring into each others eyes with their breath accelerated through half-opened mouths. They both didn't give a damn about the wine anymore, the longing for a good fuck after a long time was simply stronger.

He immersed his fingers into her thick hair and pushed it behind her back. Then he went with his hands over her breasts and stroke with his fingertips her hardened nipples. She grabbed his belt, unbuttoned it and right after that also his pants. Keaira reached into his crotch and pulled out from his pants his big hardened cock. She ducked down and took the tip of his cock into her mouth. Lorcan tilted his head back with closed eyes, gently pushed her head with his hands against himself and moaned aloud. Just a few moves in her mouth were enough for his cock to become as hard as stone.  
He slightly pushed her away, smiled and started to unbutton the buckles on his high elven boots. Keaira as well took off her boots and untied the leather sheath with her knife from her thigh. She threw it onto the ground. Lorcan took off his pants in the meantime and started to take off hers. He pulled them down to the middle of her thighs, then grabbed her ass and hoisted her onto the high table. She straightened her legs and he took her pants off with a twitch and threw them onto the ground.

She propped herself with her hands on the table behind her and silently spread her legs wide open. He crouched, pinned his lips to her pussy and started to lick her with his tongue. She was very wet already. Keaira tilted her head back and loudly moaned. When he straightened up after a while, she grabbed his cock and pushed it against her pussy. Lorcan gripped her ass, pulled it onto the table's edge and slid inside her with a single powerful thrust. They both loudly groaned with lust. She pushed the wine jug and the cups aside with her hand, laid her back onto the table and clenched her legs around his loins. He firmly grasped her hips and started to thrust inside her fast and hard. They were both throatily moaning. She squeezed her breast with one hand, placed the other on her clit and started to play with it. He was watching her hand above his cock sliding deep and hard in and out of her pussy. He felt her tighten around his cock. He wanted to wait until she cums, but he simply couldn't resist anymore. He emptied himself inside her during a few very deep powerful thrusts with a long muffled scream. She yelled shortly in pain because of his length.

Shortly after Lorcan took a few deep breaths and released the grip of his arms on her hips. He bended over her, embraced her head with his hands and slid with his tongue inside her half-opened moaning mouth. Keaira pushed her lips against his in a passionate kiss, but didn't stop to play with her clit. He felt her pussy squeezing his cock more and more inside her. He pulled his lips slightly away and watched her. Her breath stopped for a moment, her back arched and she tilted her head back with a loud throaty groan. Her pussy tightened hard so abruptly, that he quickly released her head with one hand, again firmly grasped her hip and thrusted inside her once more so that she doesn't push him out. At the same time he groaned into her ear enjoying with closed eyes that overwhelming feeling. Her arms relaxed and she hugged him around his shoulders. He was standing there still bended over her with his face buried in her hair on her neck, propped up on one elbow holding her head and with his other hand still gripping her hip. They were both panting heavily.

„That was exactly what I needed..." Keaira whispered after a while into his pointed ear.  
Lorcan smiled and kissed her neck: „Me too."  
They both laughed. He straightened up and then slowly pulled his cock out of her pussy while watching her face. She wiggled a bit and purred in pleasure. He grabbed the cups with wine and handed one over to her. She sat up and they both took a big swig of wine. She jumped down from the table, laid the cup aside and took Lorcan's hand. He drank up, also laid the cup aside and followed her to bed.

* * *

The chief of the city's secret service was carefully listening to Aodhan. They knew each other already for a few years. He knew, that this mutilated elf's visit in the town means nothing good. Then he called up one of his men and gave him a few short instructions. The man immediately left.  
„Where do I find you, when I have some information for you?"  
„Red Dusk." replied Aodhan with a malicious smirk. It was the finest and most expensive brothel in Tretogor.  
The chief furrowed his eyebrows and looked at him: „I'm not sure, if they'll be willing to fulfill your special wishes."  
„I can afford it." The horrible sleazy smirk hasn't disappeared from Aodhan's face. Then he reached into his pocket, pulled out a few crowns and threw them onto the chief's table: „But just in case, send one of your men with me. I'd be glad, if the brothel's owner would very willingly agree with my visit and with my special demands..."  
The chief of the city's secret service sighed unhappily, then inserted the coins into his pocket and called up another one of his men from the hallway. He quietly whispered some instructions to him. An expression of sheer horror flashed through the face of the agent and he shortly looked at Aodhan. He froze him with a chillingly cold stare. The agent only very unwillingly nodded to his chief, turned to Aodhan and waved with his hand towards the door.  
The mutilated elf again maliciously smirked at the chief, nodded and left.

* * *

„Whom exactly are you supposed to take away from here?" asked Lorcan. He was lying next to her on the bed, supporting his head with one arm and playing with her nipple with his other hand.  
„Fourteen Scoia'tael, most of them are officers of the Vrihedd brigade." Keaira named one after another all from her list.  
„Hm... then you're most probably left with only two of them. You know that, right?" he looked at her and left his arm rested on her tummy.  
„I know, I was at the ravine..." she gulped heavily and looked up to the ceiling. After a while she turned her face to him: „But there's three of them, not two." and she winked.  
He raised one eyebrow and silently waited.  
„Coinneach Dá Reo will wait for me near Oxenfurt. We parted ways before Tretogor. I don't want to risk it, that they catch him again..."  
„Dá Reo?!" Lorcan had an open surprise on his face. „Officially he was hanged over a week ago at Drakenborg!" Then he slightly smiled: „Good job."  
She didn't return the smile and while seriously looking at him she anxiously knitted her brows: „It's rather the root cause of the whole problem. The fact, that Coinneach escaped him, is Vascoigne trying to cover up to save his own neck. That's why I'm having now a very dangerous guy on my trail. I'm not so sure if I'll be able to oppose and defeat him. I had the chance to take a very close look at him... As far as I could observe, then Dá Reo as well as the other Scoia'tael traveling with us are quite daunted by him..."  
„Who is it?" Lorcan now asked seriously as well.  
„I only know his first name – Aodhan."  
Lorcan's jaw hardened: „How much do you know about him?"  
She stared at him intently: „Obviously much less than you..."  
„I'm long enough here to know exactly who's who. He's a remorseless sadistic asshole and he has especially with Dá Reo a score to settle. He hates him. If Aodhan is on his trail, then you really have a problem... He won't give up. He'll not miss such a chance. You can get rid of this elf only by killing him... And many have already tried... Even Dá Reo himself. It ended in a draw – and Dá Reo is one hell of a dangerous guy himself..."  
He looked at her slightly anxiously and stroked her cheek. „If you can, try to avoid a fight with him, when you're alone..."  
Keaira silently nodded. She looked out through the window, it was already dark outside now. Her hand searched for his crotch and she squeezed his cock. Lorcan smiled, grabbed her upper arm and turned her onto her stomach.  
He pushed her hair away from her back, laid down onto her and started to gently kiss her neck. She purred like a cat. He stroke her ass with one hand, moved it to her pussy and started to play with her clit. After a while he kneeled behind her and lifted her ass up. She kneeled as well, propped herself with her arms against the headboard and spread her legs.  
This time he took it slowly and made a few breaks as he was sliding in and out of her. He waited until she came on his cock and emptied himself inside her a long time later, while they were both moaning aloud.

* * *

It was late evening when the agent entered the smoke-filled lounge on the brothel's ground floor. He noticed a few quickly leaving guests and the horrified faces of a few whores sitting at the bar. A loud desperate female scream sounded from the upper floor. The brothel's owner walked up close to him with his face red from anger: „I hope you came to finally take him away from here – one of them didn't survive it already!"  
The agent looked in disgust at the ceiling while the brothel's owner furiously but quietly continued: „I did not spend a lot of money for these whores just to have them tortured to death within one evening by a mad monster!"  
The agent silently nodded and slowly went upstairs. Another long painful female yell sounded behind one of the doors.  
He strongly knocked on the door: „I have the information you wanted." shouted the agent through the closed door. He wasn't in the slightest mood to enter the room.  
He heard a diabolic laugh from behind the door: „Then wait for me downstairs pal, I'm almost done!"  
The agent turned away and shortly before going downstairs he heard from behind the door another desperate scream of the tortured woman. He furrowed his brow, walked over to the bar and ordered a shot of vodka.

A while later the mutilated elf appeared at the bar with a horrifying grin on his face. He walked over to the brothel's owner: „How much?"  
„Is the other one alive?" the owner snarled.  
„She was still breathing when I left..." snickered the elf heinously.  
„You son of a bitch!" sizzled the owner and jumped up from a chair.  
The blade of Aodhan's knife was in that second pushing against his throat.  
„Take that – should be enough..." snarled the elf back into his face with a chilling voice and threw a smaller pouch with coins onto the table nearby.  
The brothel's owner gulped silently and looked down at the pouch with the knife on his throat. Cold sweat was on his forehead.  
He nodded without saying a word.  
Aodhan released him and hid the knife in one of the sheaths on his jacket. He turned to the agent: „Let's go, you can tell me everything outside..."  
The agent drank up the rest of his vodka and looked at the brothel's owner when leaving. His hands were shaking as he took the pouch with coins from the table.

* * *

Keaira and Lorcan went downstairs into the tavern. There was nobody else except the two elves and the innkeeper. The elf, who looked at her previously so surprised, when she went upstairs, was now smiling at her and winked.  
She returned the smile and winked as well.  
The dwarf turned towards her: „Shall we go?"  
She nodded. They all took their stuff and went outside the tavern. None of Dijkstra's secret agents was there anymore. She took her horse's reins into her hands and followed them through dark quiet streets. At one of the city's side gates the dwarf handed over some coins to one of the guards, silently nodded and disappeared in the darkness returning back to his tavern.

They reached the specific house without any trouble, led the horses into a narrow dark dead end street and entered the house. They went downstairs into the cellar and proceeded through small underground passages with many thick doors towards Vivaldi's bank.  
Keaira knocked on the last door and said the agreed password. A young gnome opened the door and waved them inside with his hand. They went upstairs into the bank through a secret stairwell.  
Jasper Vivaldi was already waiting for them in the hallway. When he saw Lorcan, he slightly smiled: „I had no idea, that you know the lady. If she would've said that right away, I'd be more accommodating."  
Keaira smiled at Lorcan. They both didn't say a word.

Vivaldi has led them into a small side room. Bags full of coins were lying prepared on the table. Vivaldi opened one after another and with the calculator in his hand named all the currencies and how much he's giving her for which gemstone.  
Then he pulled out of a pocket on his belt her cotton pouch and laid it onto the table: „The rest is here. I didn't want to exchange too much, so that you have no troubles on your journey..."  
He remained silent for a moment, while she has taken the bags one by one and stowed them into one of the pockets she has previously untied from her saddle.  
„You can exchange the rest in any of our banks. We gladly serve you. Just show them this..." he added and handed her a small gold coin over. She took it into her palm and looked at it. The emblem of the Vivaldi's was stamped on it.  
She raised her head, took her cotton pouch from the table and pulled out a small ruby: „I've promised you an extra provision for your promptness and discretion – thank you."  
She handed the ruby over to Jasper Vivaldi and he nodded thankfully as he took it. She inserted the gold coin with the cotton pouch into the front pocket on her belt and closed it carefully. They've shaken hands, said goodbye to Vivaldi and returned back to their horses the same way as they've arrived.

She tied thoroughly the pocket back onto the saddle making sure, that nobody will hear the coins during the horse's walk. They swinged up into their saddle's and Lorcan was leading them for a long time through many dark side streets across the city to another city gate. Without saying a word he passed by the guards standing at the gate, followed by the two other elves and Keaira. One of the elves bended in his saddle and handed over some coins to one of the guards. He took them silently, turned his face away and pretended not to see them. They quietly crossed the large southern outskirts of the city and came to the road leading to Oxenfurt.

Suddenly behind them the church bells started to ring and raised an alarm. All four of them turned in their saddles. One of the houses in the rich quarter of the town was burning. The fire and the heat were so intense, that they could see the whole tower of a nearby church brightly illuminated. They gave each other a questioning look. Lorcan nodded to the other two elves and they spurred their horses into a trot towards the east and disappeared in the darkness.

He walked up very close to her and watched the fire: „I just hope it's not Vivaldi's house..." and then he turned to her: „Rather don't stay any longer..."  
She silently nodded. He slowly reached out for her arm, tilted in his saddle towards her and gently pulled her over to himself. She kissed him.  
„I'll see you back home. Take care of yourself." he whispered, released her arm and turned his horse around. They both smiled at each other.  
„Good luck, Keaira."  
„Same to you, Lorcan." she turned her horse around as well and spurred it into a fierce gallop to the southwest towards Oxenfurt.

In that night the Vivaldi's bank in Tretogor burned to the ground. The corpses of four dead gnomes, one dwarf and Jasper Vivaldi have been found in the ruins of the burned house in the next morning. Before he died somebody chopped off all his limbs and cut out his tongue...


End file.
